Out of the Books
by Loewin83
Summary: This is a story about Lily and James after Halloween 1981. You think this is impossible? Read decide for yourselves!
1. Halloween

**Out of the Books**

**Chapter 1 - Halloween**

October 31st 1981

It was the night of Halloween in Godrics Hollow and the weather played along with this spooky day. The rain hit the trees, which were planted along the street, and the strong wind made them bow. Every now and then, the area was lit by bright lightening only to seem even darker when the flash was gone. The drumming of the raindrops, the howling of the storm and the rolling thunder created a sinister symphony.

But if you listened very carefully, you could hear a sweet noise, which did not fit in with this autumn storm. From behind a candle-lit window in the small wooden house, which stood lonely at the end of the gravel road, you could hear the soft voice of a woman singing a lullaby. Lily Potter was sitting next to a small cot and was singing her 15months old son Harry to sleep. The boy was smiling contently while he was clutching a stuffed stag, which already looked very used.

Lily finished her song and kissed Harry on the forehead. "Good night, my little one," she said softly and turned around to leave the room.

James Potter was leaning in the doorway, gazing lovingly at his young and beautiful wife. When she looked back at him, he smiled. She went up to him and pulled his head down to her for a slow and leisurely kiss. After a while, they both pulled back and Lily looked at the sleeping baby once more.

"He looks so much like you," she told her husband.

"Well, at least we know that we don't even have to bother about getting his hair trying to lie flat," he grinned.

Then he also went up to his son's bed and planted a kiss on his brow.

Lily and James left the door to the nursery, a crack wide open when they returned downstairs.

"Do you also want some hot chocolate?" James asked when he went into the kitchen.

"Oh, that would be a great idea," she called out of the living room.

The living room in the Potters' house was a cosy room with wooden walls and floor. A large round red and golden carpet covered most of the floor. In the corner, there was a fireplace (which was of course made of stone). In front of the fireplace stood a dark red sofa and next to the sofa, a small couch table, made of cherry wood. On it, there was a bowl with some fruit, some scattered Quidditch magazines and a copy of the Daily Prophet. Behind the sofa, there was a very big cupboard, which included some shelves with many books, porcelain and several wooden handcrafted pieces of art.

After a few minutes, James put two steaming mugs on the small table and joined Lily on the sofa. While he was reaching for a quidditch magazine, she sighed and leaned on to him comfortably. He put his left arm around her shoulder and while he was absent-mindedly tracing circles on her naked arm , he read the magazine in the other hand. Lily relaxed leaning on him and closed her eyes. But after a while, she sat up straight again and looked at him with worry in her brilliant green eyes.

"James, have you heard anything of Peter recently? We haven't seen him in over three weeks."

James shrugged. "I'm sure he has gone into hiding. I mean, nobody knows that he is our secret keeper, so he is not really in danger, but I guess he thought it would be safer," he tried to reassure her.

"But what if they have captured him? We should check on him, just to make sure," she said.

"Yeah, it's probably better," he agreed. "But we shouldn't do it ourselves. I'll ask Sirius tomorrow to see if he is alright. Don't worry."

Lily nodded and sighed. "I'm just so on edge all the time since we have heard about the prophecy."

James put aside the quidditch magazine, which he hadn't really been reading anyway, now and pulled his wife into a kiss again. She opened her mouth under his lips and returned the kiss passionately.

Suddenly, they were interrupted by a popping noise. Both of them stood up very quickly and drew their wands. They both saw the source of simultaneously and gasped.

"Why aren't the two of you sweet together?" said the tall and pale man, who suddenly stood in their living room and pointed his wand at them.

James swallowed hard. "What do you want, Voldemort?" he managed to say with a steady voice.

"I'm pretty sure you know what I want, Potter," he sneered while he looked at the stairs, which led to the second floor of the house. "There was a certain prophecy I have heard of..."

"Lily, go and take Harry, I'll keep him off!" James shouted.

Voldemort threw his head back and let out a very wrong-sounding, high-pitched laugh. "You'll keep me off, Potter?"

Then he looked at James through narrowed eyes. "_Crucio!_" he cried suddenly.

But James was prepared and jumped out of the way of the curse, knocking over the small couch table. Out of the corner of his eyes, he could see Lily speeding up the stairs.

"_Expelliarmus,_" he shouted now at the dark wizard, who dodged the curse easily and had already pointed his wand at James again crying, "_Serpensortia."_

A huge snake shot out of his wand and landed a foot away from James. Before he could do anything, the snake attacked and bit him in the left leg.

James gasped in pain, but then he pointed his wand at the snake and coughed out, _"Evanesco!"_ The snake was gone but the pain in his ankle remained.

His left leg started shaking and James broke out in cold sweat. He could tell that the snake must have been poisonous. He tried to put another disarming spell on Voldemort, but missed.

Voldemort grinned at him evilly and cried, "_Crucio,_" again.

With a huge effort, James managed to leap away, but his injured leg could not take the landing, and so he crashed sideways into the bookcase.

He looked up at Voldemort grimly and hatefully, his eyes staring into those evilly glowing red slits, when the dark wizard raised his wand at him a final time.

"_Avada Kedavra_!" he cried in this terrible high-pitched voice and a bright green flash came speeding towards James.

"I just hope I have given Lily and Harry enough time," was his last thought before the blinding green light reached him, and then he knew nothing.

Upstairs, Lily had just opened the window and cast a cushioning charm on the ground outside so she and Harry would not get hurt jumping out of the window. But the eerie green light that suddenly came from the corridor let her hesitate. Then she heard the sinister laughter again and she felt her heart cramp. She knew that James was dead.

A heavy sob escaped her but then she managed to pull herself together. As fast as she could, she grabbed Harry from his cot and stepped towards the open window. But before she reached it, Voldemort popped out in front of her and blocked the way. She desperately spun around and lunged for the door, but Voldemort had already locked it with a wave of his wand.

She turned around to face him now.

"Give me the boy," he commanded, his red eyes glinting dangerously at her.

She clutched Harry desperately now. "Not Harry, not Harry. Please not Harry!" she pleaded with the dark wizard.

"Stand aside, you silly girl," he snarled at her.

"Not Harry, please no, take me, kill me instead," she cried, now kneeling in front of him.

She could see how Voldemort trained his wand at the small bundle she held in her arms while he formed the words,_ "Avada Kedavra!"_

Another flash of blinding green light shot from his wand towards the boy and his mother. Lily threw herself around, so that she protected Harry with her body and only a second later the curse hit her in the back.

She felt a sharp pain ripping through her whole body and then she was falling through blackness, her head spinning and hurting madly, and finally she felt nothing anymore.

Lily was feeling terrible. Her whole body was aching and especially her head was spinning and pounding as if someone was hitting it with a hammer repeatedly. She opened her eyes a crack and saw all kinds of colourful lights dancing before her. Then her ears also seemed to start working again and she became aware of all the deafening noise around her. It took some seconds for her to notice that it was very loud music she heard and that the pounding in her head was in the same rhythm as the floor slightly vibrated to the base.

She groaned and sat up. She realized that she had been sitting at a small round table, her head resting on the slightly sticky surface. A glass with a rest of an amber liquid was standing in front of her next to a plastic jack-o-lantern. The whole room was decorated with plastic pumpkins and bats. Other than the colourful beams of light, which were moving to the rhythm of the music, it was dark and there were no windows in what seemed to be a cellar of a pub. The air was hot and humid and heavy with the smell of cigarette smoke and sweat.

Lily shook her head and groaned as the movement made the pain in her head even more intensive. Ignoring the nausea which was wandering up from her stomach she tried to remember what had happened. One second, she had been on the receiving end of Voldemorts death curse and now she obviously was at some sort of Halloween party?

She put her forehead into her right hand while her right elbow sat on the table. She was feeling so unbelievably tired.

Suddenly, she felt a hand on her shoulder and a voice close to her ear shouted over the loud music, "Are you alright? You look a bit ill."

She looked up and her breath got caught in her throat. A young man with unruly black hair and glasses was looking down at her. She jumped out of her chair and threw her arms around him.

"James, you are alive!" she cried happily, pulled his head down and started kissing him desperately.

The young man went totally stiff as if someone had put the _petrificus totalus_ on him. Finally he sputtered and backed up from her. He stared at her strangely and struggled to regain his composure.

"My name is Jack, not James. And the last time I checked, I wasn't in mortal danger, so yeah, I'm alive," he finally managed to say.

He sounded a little irritated and more than a little confused.

Lily backed up. "No, but you are..." she began, but the total lack of recognition on his face made her stop. "I'm sorry, I thought you were someone else," she mumbled.

Jack nodded. "So and you are...?" he prompted her.

"Hm? Oh, I'm Lil- I'm Liz," she said and smiled uncertainly at him.

_Where did that come from?_ she wondered. _Why did I tell him, that my name was Liz?_

Then she remembered. Her name was Elizabeth Hamrick and she was a journalist.

Suddenly, her legs felt very weak. She held on to the table for support. Jack caught her upper arm and helped her to get her balance back.

"Well Liz, we better get you home," he said with a concerned look on his face. Lily nodded weakly.

Jack helped her putting her arm around his neck and led her out of the pub while she leaned on him heavily. They both shivered in the cold night air after they had left the pub. Lily's headache was becoming worse every second and she was positively feeling really sick now. She let go of Jack and emptied her stomach on the street.

He looked a bit helplessly at her panting, while she stood shivering with her hands on her knees, and gave her a handkerchief, so that she could wipe her mouth.

"Do you have someone who can take care of you when you get home?" he asked.

She shook her head no, not trusting herself to say anything in case more than words came out of her mouth.

Jack sighed. "Well, then I better take you to my place for the night. I'd hate for you to stay alone in this state."

She nodded again, so Jack hailed a cab for the two of them.

"Idlewind Road 7," he told the taxi driver.

Lily leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes. Her head was hurting and spinning and she suppressed a new wave of nausea, which threatened to roll through her again. _Why am I not dead? The Killing Curse hit me full force!_ she thought.

Then she looked at the young man, who was sitting next to her and realization hit her: _Of course, Lily Potter is dead! I am Elizabeth Hamrick now. And James Potter is dead as well. He is Jack Whatever-his-Last-Name-Is now. But why do I remember and he doesn't?_

Lily shook her head, now totally confused, which turned out to be a bad mistake. She clamped her hand before her mouth and choked, "Could we stop really quick?"

After what seemed like an endless drive and two more stops, they finally reached Idlewind Road. Jack paid the very irritated taxi driver a generous tip and smiled apologetically at him. Then he put his arm around Lily - _no Liz_! – and helped her up to his appartement. It was up on the third floor of an old brick house. On a band-aide, which was plastered below the door bell, stood "Pearson" in block letters, written with a blue ball pen.

Liz was too tired to look around in the small apartment. Jack showed her the bedroom and told her, he would sleep next door on the couch, in case she needed anything. She just nodded, not really realizing what he was telling her, and dropped into bed falling asleep immediately.

Jack made himself some tea, staring into nothingness, while he drank it slowly. He had a feeling he knew this girl but he couldn't place her. Actually, that was the reason why he had walked up to her at the party at all. He sighed and finished his tea.

Before retiring on the couch for the night, Jack checked to make sure that Liz was alright. She was sleeping peacefully on his bed now and Jack found himself gazing at her face. When her brow was not furrowed and her mouth was not twisted in pain, she looked really beautiful. Her long dark red hair framed her pale, thin face like waves. She even had a small smile playing around her lips now. _She must be having pleasant dreams_, he thought, smiling to himself.

Then he remembered the way she had looked at him at the party, her eyes full of love and happiness. Jack had had many girlfriends but none had ever looked at him like this. And then she had called him James.

_Oh, this James-fellow must be the luckiest guy on earth, to be loved so much by such a pretty girl_, he thought wistfully.

He closed the door to the bedroom quietly and went to sleep on the couch.

November 1st 1981

Liz awoke to the beeping noise of a garbage truck going backwards on the road in front of the house. She groaned and turned around in bed, her eyes still closed. There was a dull ache behind her forehead and her mouth was dry. She stretched and squinted through her eye lashes. The bedroom was filled with blue light, which filtered through the closed window curtains. She looked around the unfamiliar room and sat up, trying to remember where she was. Soon images from the last day were beginning to tumble through her head. _Voldemort threatening to kill her son and ending up throwing the Killing Curse at her – the Halloween Party – her sickness – James, who was Jack now and had no memory of his former life..._

Then she remembered: Jack had taken her home and she was in his bedroom now. The bedroom was very small – it could not be much bigger than eight or nine square metres. Only a large double bed and a cheap pressboard-wardrobe fit in it.

Suddenly, she remembered something else – Harry! After Voldemort had cursed her, she had been unable to protect Harry any longer. Had Voldemort killed him, too? She was almost certain of that. So if Harry was dead, had he also been somehow transported into another life, like her and James? _If he was, I will find him_, she promised herself.

Having made this decision, she got up determinately and threw a dressing gown around her shoulders, which had been lying on the unused side of the bed, and went to look for the bathroom. The bedroom door led out into a dark and empty corridor. Only three pairs of shoes stood close to the entrance door, one of them her own, and a jacket and a cloak hung on a hook at the wall. Other than the entrance and the bedroom door, there were two more of them. The one to her right stood ajar and she could see Jack moving inside the room behind it. She knocked quietly and went into what seemed like the combination of kitchen, living room and work room. Jack was already dressed and put some blankets away from the couch, where he had slept during the night before.

When he noticed that Liz had entered the room, he turned around and smiled.

"Good morning, are you feeling better?" he asked.

Liz smiled back at him. "Good morning. Yes, I feel much better, thank you. I was going to have a shower."

Jack nodded and showed her the way to the bathroom. "The towels are in that cupboard," he told her.

After Liz had finished her shower and felt refreshed again, she joined Jack in the living room, where he had already fixed some breakfast for the two of them. She sat opposite to him while he put some egg and bacon on both their plates. They were eating in a slightly awkward silence. Finally, Jack cleared his throat and attempted to make conversation with this girl, who spent the night in his apartment, but the only thing he knew about her was her first name.

"So, er – were you alone at that party yesterday?"

"Well, at first I wasn't alone. My co-worker Ashley had persuaded me to accompany her but then she found some guy and went off with him. I wasn't in the mood for a party in the first place, so I just sat there at the table where we met. And you?" she asked, her eyes twinkling, "Whom did you abandon when you rushed to help me?"

"Actually, I wasn't really abandoning someone, rather escaping a former girlfriend of mine. So I guess I should thank you for being sick, as it gave me an excuse to leave the party," he grinned at her.

Liz grinned back. "So what are you doing when you don't bring girls home with you in order to flee from other girls?" she let her eye wander around the room and noticed a large number of books on the shelves and on the desk, close to the window. Nodding her head at them, she asked, "Are you at university?"

"Yeah, I'm studying to become a teacher for P.E. and for physics."

Liz guffawed. James Potter, the nightmare of all teachers, was going to be a teacher himself. _Of course he isn't James Potter in this life,_ a nasty voice in her head reminded her. But her thoughts were interrupted.

"What's so funny about that?" Jack asked, only half pretending that indignant tone in his voice.

Liz blushed a little embarrassed. "I'm sorry. You just remind me of someone very strongly, and I have a very hard time imagining _him_ as a teacher."

Jack looked at her with an unreadable expression. "Is it that James, you mistook me for at the party?" he asked her.

Liz fought the urge to squirm in her seat, but then she just nodded sadly.

Jack, who had, of course, noticed the sadness on her face, put his hand on hers and asked quietly, "What happened?"

Liz swallowed. How could she tell him that he was actually James and that he had been her husband before they both were killed? He would not hesitate for a second to carry her off to St. Mungos – if he even knew what St. Mungos was, that is.

Finally she looked defiantly at him. "He is dead," she said more sharply than she intended to.

Then she took a deep breath and forced herself to calm down. "I – I don't want to talk about it – please," she added more quietly.

Jack was at a loss for words, from her reaction as well as from the information he had just received.

He squeezed her hand gently and cleared his throat. "I'm so sorry Liz," he finally managed to say.

Then he drooped his shoulders and stared down on the plate in front of him. "I really shouldn't have brought it up."

"It's alright. You couldn't know," Lily said softly. Then she looked up in his face. Jack felt her gaze on him and raised his eyes reluctantly so that their eyes locked. A small smile curled Liz's lips now.

"You know, you can't even begin to imagine how much you are like him."

A/N: I want to thank my beta-readers Kabelkarsten and Jörg for doing a wonderful job.

I'm looking forward to see, what you think of this story.

Stay tuned for Chapter 2 "Where are the Wizards?"


	2. Where are the Wizards

**Chapter 2 – Where are the wizards?**

Liz was glad that it was a Saturday and she did not have to work, so she could start searching for her son right away today. So soon after breakfast she was ready to leave Jacks apartment.

"I don't have any plans today," Jack told her. "I can give you a lift home if you want?"

Liz, who did not have an idea yet where she would start looking, shook her head. "No thanks, I need to do some things on my way, that could take a while."

Jack shrugged and was surprised that he was a bit disappointed by this answer. "Well, if you are sure."

Then he scribbled some numbers on the rim of a newspaper and gave it to her. "But if you need any help or anything just call me, okay?"

Liz smiled at him when she took the paper. "You are sweet Jack." Then her smile grew a little playful. "You know, I might need some help dining tomorrow night."

He grinned broadly at her now. "Of course, I will not let you down."

"Thank you again for letting me stay for the night. I don't know where I would have ended up, if you hadn't taken care of me." She smiled at him again, then gave him a quick peck on the cheek and left his flat.

On the way from Jack's house to the tube station, Liz thought about how she could find Harry.

Liz already suspected that she was not a witch anymore, but she had not tried to do magic yet. So before she went downstairs to the tube station, she hid in a small alleyway to try whether her "death" had affected her magical abilities. Of course, she did not have her wand anymore, but she had always been rather good at wandless magic.

The alleyway where she stood now was pretty messy. Rude messages were sprayed with graffiti on the building walls and trash was scattered on the sidewalks. But the trash came in handy for her purpose now. She would try to levitate an empty beer bottle.

Liz screwed up her face in concentration and stared at the bottle, while she aimed her hand at it. _"Wingardium Leviosa!"_ she said determinedly, but softly so that she wouldn't be heard by any muggles nearby.

The bottle did not move. She concentrated harder and tried again. _"Wingardium Leviosa!"_ The same result.

She went closer to the piece of rubbish and put her hand right next to it, without really touching it. Then she willed the bottle to move with every single of her brain cells. _"Wingardium Leviosa!"_ she cried, her voice really powerful this time.

But obviously, the bottle was not impressed at all as it still lay at the same place as before.

Liz sighed in frustration and looked up. An elderly woman stood in the alley and stared at her strangely. Liz flushed a little and stood up, then she hurried out of the alleyway to the tube.

"Great," she said to herself, "I'm a muggle now. That really doesn't make it easier to find Harry."

But then her face lit up again. If she could not use magic to find her son, then she would need to contact someone who could.

Liz smiled to herself and decided to go to Diagon Alley. From there she could send an owl to Albus Dumbledore, who would surely help her.

After having made this decision, Liz went down to the station with a bounce in her step, which made her stand out against the passers-by, who hurried along with hunched shoulders and grim expressions on this cold and wet November day.

Liz did not have to wait long for her train, but she had to change trains twice and then had to walk the last bit to the Leaky Cauldron. So it took her almost an hour to reach the street where the wizarding pub was situated.

Soon she had found the bookshop and the jeweller between which the entrance of the Leaky Cauldron lay, invisible for muggle eyes.

_Invisible for muggle eyes – that must be the reason why I can't see it. I'm a muggle now. _

So Liz decided just to wait in front of it until someone went in or came out. It could not take too long, she reckoned. It was Saturday and close to noon, after all. She looked into the windows of the shops around the area, but always kept an eye on the invisible gap between the bookshop and the jewellery store. But when, after more than half an hour, there was still no witch or wizard in sight, she started to get impatient – and she was not the only one. The jeweller looked very suspiciously at her through his window. Liz made a great show of looking at her wrist watch and sighing, as though waiting for someone who was not on time.

After another twenty minutes, Liz started to doubt she was in the right place. But she knew that the Leaky Cauldron was here. She had used this entrance numerous times. She scowled at the gap now. Her feet were freezing and she was beginning to get hungry – and the thought of a nice warm butterbeer, which was only a few meters away but impossible for her to reach, did not exactly help matters.

Then she noticed someone staring at her. She turned around and saw that the jeweller had come out of his shop. He walked towards her.

"Listen ma'am, I don't really like people loitering in front of my shop for hours on end," he told her. "It makes me quite nervous, you know."

He sounded very suspicious and Liz had no doubt that he would call the police, if she gave him the slightest further reason to do so.

She smiled appeasingly at him. "I'm sorry. I've been waiting for my friend, but obviously he didn't show up. I think I have waited long enough for him now, though."

The shopkeeper nodded, but did not really look convinced. When Liz walked away from him, she could still feel his stare between her shoulder blades. But finally, she turned around a corner and sighed.

_What's wrong with wizard folks?_ she thought irritably. _Why can't they go into the Leaky Cauldron for lunch today, when I need them to?_

In this moment her stomach growled very loudly.

_Now lunch, that's an idea_, she thought. As she could not eat at the wizarding pub, she settled for some fish and chips and a coke in a shabby cafe.

While she was eating, she pondered about what she could do next. Then she remembered that Cathy Linings, one of her fellow Gryffindors in her year, was learning to be a healer at St. Mungo's. Surely she would let her use her fireplace to contact Dumbledore.

Liz finished her lunch and went back to the tube station to go to the wizarding hospital. Soon she stood in front of the large and empty department store which, unknown to (most) muggles, housed hundreds of ill and wounded wizards and witches. She went to the large shop window which she knew was the entrance – and stopped, surprised.

The window was boarded up. Liz frowned, then she went closer and peaked through the boards. She could not see anything, just darkness. She pushed her hands against the boards to see if they were a portal like the wall between platforms nine and ten at King's Cross, but the boards were very solid and did not admit her hand.

She backed up and looked at the five-storey building. It was the right building, but why couldn't she get in?

She went along the whole front, peering through every window and touching it the same way she had touched the boards to no avail. Then she went around the building to look for a door, but it was boarded up as well. Liz was getting very frustrated now.

Impatiently, she knocked at the door and against the windows, hoping that someone might come out. And if it only were ministry wizards to obliviate her, she could at least tell them that she knew about the wizarding world and that she needed the help of the Hogwarts headmaster.

She sighed. Nobody had reacted to her knocking. _It almost seems as if this building is empty after all. _

Then she had an idea. She looked around nervously to see whether she was alone, then she took a stone to smash one of the old, dusty windows. If the building was inhabited by wizards, it would be no problem for them to repair it, and if it was not, nobody would probably care about a broken window in an almost broken-down house.

She winced at the noise of breaking glass and took another nervous look around. Then she stepped into what once was the department, which sold men's clothes. She could see some dummies standing around in the twilight, but the otherwise empty room was definitely not the busy foyer of a hospital.

Liz was utterly disappointed and even more confused. What had happened to St. Mungo's? How could it be gone from one day to the other?

She took a deep breath and left the old, dead shell of a house.

_Well, lets try one more location_, she decided and tried not to sound too hopeless to herself.

Once more she went down to the tube station and this time, she seemed to fit in way better into the grey mass of people with hunched shoulders and grim expressions. After some stations, she emerged from the tube again, then walked some blocks and finally stood in front of a totally ordinary red phone booth.

She frowned when she saw that it was not out of order.

_That's dangerous_, she thought. _Every unsuspecting muggle could go in here and end up in the Ministry of Magic._

Then another thought sneaked into her mind. _What if it doesn't lead into the Ministry?_ She scowled and tried to push this thought away forcefully.

Liz entered the phone booth determinedly. She took the receiver and dialled the code number to be admitted to the ministry. But instead of the voice which inquired her name and business, she only heard three annoying beeping noises and an automatic female voice, which told her that the number she had dialled did not exist.

Liz took a deep breath and forced herself to stay calm, then tried to dial the code number again – with the same result.

Angry and disappointed, she slammed the receiver down and leaned against the wall of the phone booth, needing all of her energy to keep her eyes dry from angry and desperate tears.

_How hard could it be for a muggle who knew about the wizarding world to find a single bloody wizard in the middle of London!_

Feeling totally depressed and abandoned by the world, Liz decided to go home.

Her legs felt like lead when she finally reached her home and trudged up the stairs to her apartment. The flat felt dark and empty and the first thing she did was to switch on the TV, only to avoid this feeling of loneliness.

Then she let herself fall in a cosy armchair leaned her head back and closed her eyes in exhaustion and frustration. How was she supposed to find her son without being able to perform magic and without help?

Liz sat up and tried to view all the facts about the last 24 hours logically. _Had it only been 24 hours?_ she thought, amazed.

She and James were killed by Voldemort, but somehow, both had ended up here in London as muggles, who already had a totally different personal history. While she could remember her old life, James could not.

If Harry was also killed, he probably ended up as a muggle as well. And as James and she both had turned up at the same place, chances were that Harry had also turned up close by. But what would a toddler do in a disco?

No, either he suddenly lived with one of the families around that part of the city or he only was there during the night for some reason.

Liz did not like either thought, but now she had a point where she could start researching.

Tomorrow she would ring all the families who lived close to the pub where the Halloween party had taken place and then she could still ask in hospitals and orphanages about a 15monthold boy with unruly black hair who had mysteriously turned up.

Feeling somewhat calmed with her new plan, Liz only ate something small for dinner and went to bed early and fell asleep almost immediately.

_She was flying. The dark landscape was speeding by below her. In the distance, she could see a large accumulation of tiny lights on the ground. Must be a big city, she thought. But she flew past that. Slowly, the lights grew scarcer and she felt that she lost height. And then suddenly, she felt solid ground under her feet. She looked around. Obviously, she was standing in a neat garden of a small house in a suburb of the city she had seen earlier. Something felt very familiar about this place. She had been here before._

_Suddenly she whirled around. Something had landed behind her. It was a – motorcycle? A huge man climbed off it, holding a small bundle in his hands, and smiled sadly at a corner some metres to the left of Liz. He didn't seem to notice her at all. Liz followed the look of the large man and now saw two figures – a very old man and a stern-looking woman - whom she hadn't noticed before._

_She realized that she knew all of the persons. The large man walked towards the two others, who were obviously waiting for him, and handed them the bundle. The old man gazed lovingly at it and said something, which Liz couldn't understand. In fact, she couldn't understand anything any of the persons said. She couldn't hear any sound at all. It was as though she was watching a silent film. She walked closer to them to see what was in the bundle. It was a small boy with black hair and a wound on his forehead, which was shaped like a lightning bolt. He was sleeping peacefully._

_The old man now put the bundle on the doorstep of the house, in front of which they were standing and pulled a letter out of his robes. He put the letter into one of the folds of the bundle and Liz could read whom it was addressed to: _

_Mr and Mrs Dursley_

_Privet Drive 4_

_Little Whinging, Surrey_

Liz woke up with a jolt. She had found him!

She knew it had not been a dream. Hagrid had found Harry and Dumbledore and McGonagall had left him in the care of Petunia Dursley and her family. The only thing she had to do now was to drive to Little Whinging and pick him up!

Liz felt how tears of gratitude and relief rolled down her cheeks. Tomorrow, she would see her son again, she thought happily before she fell asleep again.

Liz woke up very early the next morning. She dressed quickly and forced down some toasts with marmelade and a cup of coffee. Then she grabbed her car keys and practically sprinted down the stairs of the house.

After a drive of not quite two hours, she turned into Privet Drive in Little Whinging. She had not been here in almost four years, but the suburb did not seem to have changed one bit.

Liz was a bit nervous about meeting her sister, but on the other hand, she thought that Petunia might be glad that she did not have to put up with Harry after all, as she was not really fond of magic.

Liz parked the car in front of number four and climbed out. She went up the driveway to the entrance door and had almost rung the bell when her gaze fell on the name plate next to it. It did not say Dursley. Liz frowned and hesitated. But then she rang the bell anyway. A formidable lady in her sixties opened the door and looked at Liz suspiciously.

"I don't buy anything," she informed her.

"Er, good morning ma'am. I don't want to sell anything. I'm just looking for a Petunia Dursley who is supposed to live here," she smiled at the lady uncertainly.

"There is no Petunia Dursley living here. I have lived here all my live and know all the people in the neighbourhood. But I don't know a Petunia Dursley," she said and was already closing the door.

"And what about Evans? Petunia Evans?" Liz hurried to ask her. "Don't know her either," the old lady said and this time, she closed the door.

Liz shook her head and went back to her car, at a loss at what to do now. She had been so certain that Harry was living with her sister now. And the dream had showed her that her sister still lived here. Well, maybe it was just that – a dream.

And then suddenly, Liz snapped her head up and her eyes went wide in shock and in understanding.

She knew now why she had not met any other wizards and witches in London yesterday and why Petunia Dursley did not seem to exist.

She had not just slipped into another body after she had "died", she had slipped into another world - a world where there were no wizards and no Petunia Dursley!

A/N: I want to thank Jörg and Kabelkarsten, my wonderful beta readers.

Stay tuned for chapter 3 "Different Worlds - Same Feelings"


	3. Different Worlds Same Feelings

**Chapter 3 – Different worlds – same feelings**

It was still early in the morning and the rising sun coloured the clouds in the eastern sky over Little Whinging deeply red. In front of Number Four, Privet Drive, there was a dark blue Volkswagen Beetle. A young woman with red hair had her head resting on her arms, which were lying over the steering wheel. Her slim body was shaking as sobs ran through her.

After Liz had realized that she really was dead for the world that she had known for more than 21 years and that she was forced to live on as a different person in a different world, a huge wave of countless different emotions had rolled over her and overwhelmed her.

On the one hand, she felt a huge relief that Harry had obviously survived Voldemort's attack and would be able to grow up as a wizard, but on the other hand, she – his mother – would not be there for him. He would grow up on himself, and right now he was with her sister, who hated and feared magic. She was also worried that Voldemort would try to kill him again, after he had not succeeded the first time. And this time she was not there to protect him, to sacrifice herself for him.

Then she breathed in deeply several times and tried to pull herself together. Others were looking after her son now. Albus Dumbledore, Minerva McGonagall and Hagrid were caring for him, and she trusted all of them. She did not like that Harry was staying with her horrible sister, but she was sure that was only temporary, as his godfather and legal guardian was James's best friend, Sirius Black. Certainly, Harry only had to stay with Petunia until arrangements were made that Sirius could take him.

With the realization that Harry was cared for, even if she could not be a mother for him, her thoughts strayed away from her son. If she really was dead, after-life was certainly different than she had expected it to be. It seemed so totally normal and ordinary. It was so similar to her previous life that it had taken her more than a day to figure out that the world as she knew it did not exist any longer for her!

Liz sighed and shook her head. She felt the big loss of all the people she knew. Sure, Liz Hamrick knew a lot of people in her own world, co-workers, family and old friends from school, but for Lily Potter, all those people seemed so unreal. _I guess that is fine for people like James, who don't remember anything of their old life. But to remember and not being able to be there..._

Thinking about James, she remembered that she wanted to meet Jack in the evening and still had not called him about it. _Oh well, at least **he** seems like a real person_, she thought, even though his personality seemed slightly different. It would surely be interesting to get to know Jack Pearson better. She just had to make sure that she did not compare him with her James all the time.

Finally she sighed, wiped her eyes dry of tears and started the car again to drive home.

Jack was feeling restless. He was sitting at his desk, staring at his physics books and his schedule without really seeing them. Tomorrow morning, he would be going to teach his first class ever. He had not done a good job preparing for that so far and had actually hoped to get his lesson ready today, but he just could not concentrate. During the last two hours, when he had been trying to read the text about mechanics over again, the best he could do was reading five sentences in a row until _her_ face popped into his mind, crushing his concentration again.

It was now eleven a.m. and Liz had said that she would call him about dinner tonight. So far the phone had stayed silent. James shook his head. _What's wrong with you, boy?_ he scolded himself. _Sure, she is beautiful, but that's no reason for forgetting everything else around._

It was all he could do not to start pacing in his own flat. _Get a grip, Jack! Even if she doesn't call, it shouldn't matter so much. You hardly know her; you only met her the day before yesterday!_

But as much as he tried to convince himself otherwise, it did matter to him and he caught himself sneaking glances at the silent phone every few minutes.

When it finally rang, about half past eleven, Jack jumped in his seat. His heart was beating very loudly and rapidly as he picked up the receiver.

"Jack –," he croaked into it, then cleared his throat and tried again. "Jack Pearson."

"Er, hi Jack. This is Liz. You remember me? You let me spend the night at your flat yesterday," he heard her voice from the other end of the line.

He was so glad that she could not see him as he felt himself grow very warm and he was sure that his face was pretty pink right now. "Oh, er, hi Liz. Of course, I remember you. Do you still need help dining tonight?"

He could almost hear her smiling as she answered. "Yes, that's why I'm calling. If you want to, we could meet at this Italian place in –"

But Jack interrupted her. "Don't tell me. Why don't I pick you up and then you can show me the way?"

"Sounds good to me. So let's say, you are at my place at about seven?" Liz asked.

"Okay, see you at seven o'clock tonight then," Jack confirmed, smiling happily. The last second before the end of the conversation, he suddenly remembered something. "Wait!" he cried into the receiver.

"I don't know where you live." Again he was very glad that she could not see him blush.

"Oh right," came the slightly embarrassed answer and then Liz told him her address.

When they finally hung up, Jack sighed and leaned back in his armchair, his eyes closed and a wide grin across his face. He was really looking forward to this night. After a few minutes, though, he got up, clapped in his hands enthusiastically and returned to his work. He was feeling like he could do anything now. And for almost an hour he worked effectively and got done quite a lot. But finally, his concentration decreased again. Although while earlier on, the reason had been his nervousness and anxiety, it now was all the energy bubbling inside him.

He pushed his books away from him determinedly, packed his _dobok_ and training gear and left his flat, a spring in his step as he descended the stairs.

Jack was glad that he had a key to the gym now. So he could train, even though it was a Sunday, without having to call one of the three other masters. Only two weeks ago, he had passed his black-belt exam. He was a master of Tae Kwon Do himself now, even though he had not yet received the official document from _Kukkiwon_, the Tae Kwon Doheadquarters in Korea.

The way to the gym was a ten-minute bike ride, but Jack got there in only seven minutes. He got dressed in no time, even though the new belt was still a little stiff and did not co-operate well when he tried to put the traditional knot in it.

Jack started his work-out with his warm-up routine. First jogging twenty laps around the gym, then doing some stretching and finally going through some easy basic techniques, such as different blocks, kicks and punches. When he was done with the warm-up and had moved on to the large punching bag in the corner of the gym, the door opened and Derek Matthews, a twenty-four year-old, athletic man, joined Jack. Derek also had the 1st Dan (the first of the nine master grades at Tae Kwon Do), just like Jack, but he had it for more than one year already.

Jack interrupted his exercise to greet Derek with a handshake and a slight bow. While Derek was moving through his warm-up routine, Jack was doing some _poomsae_, patterns of movements which symbolize a fight against an imaginary opponent.

Jack was quite glad that Derek had decided to get in for some extra training as well. After all, Tae Kwon Do was a martial art. And to fight one usually needed at least two persons. So after Derek had finished his stretching exercises, they both put on their protective gear and stood face to face on the blue and red line in the large square with the yellow border, which was used as fighting area. They bowed to each other and then, with a loud yell, they moved into their fighting positions.

What followed was a blur of their bodies moving forwards, sideways, twisting around, legs and arms flying and both of them yelling loudly with almost every kick. Every five minutes, they took a one-minute break to catch their breath and get some water and then they resumed their fight, just as fierce as before.

The two young men were well matched, even though their styles were quite different. While Jack was whirling around, and kicking as though his energy resources were endless, Derek was a bit more on the defensive side, blocking Jacks assaults more or less successfully and scoring for the most part through counter attacks.

Finally, after more than an hour of intensive fighting, they shook hands and slapped each other on the back, before they sunk on the bleachers on the side of the gym, totally exhausted. For a few minutes both of them were just happy to sit there, their heads leaned back against the wall of the gym, trying to slow down their breathing, while sweat was running down their faces in streams.

Finally Jack grinned at Derek. "I really needed that."

Derek grinned back at him. "My pleasure. If you ever again need to be beaten up, just tell me."

"_You_ beat _me_ up? Have I missed anything?" He narrowly ducked a half-hearted swat from Derek, then took his water bottle and emptied it in his mouth.

Slowly, with almost automatic movement, he took off his protection, which was clung to his skin with sweat.

When he had finally packed up his gear, he nodded tiredly at Derek. "Training? Tuesday night?" he asked, as if he was too exhausted now to build whole sentences.

Derek nodded back at him and so Jack left the gym and went down the flight of stairs to the changing rooms, were he peeled off his wet dobok, folded it neatly and put on his everyday clothes. He was really looking forward to a nice shower when he came home.

After Jack had stepped out of the shower, feeling refreshed and relaxed he still had more than an hour to pass, until he had to leave again to pick up Liz. So he fixed himself a sandwich and returned to his books. But of course, an hour was not nearly enough to finish his lesson planning. So when he finally abandoned his work at half past six, he tried not to care about the nervous feeling in his stomach concerning his lesson in the morning, but tried to be cheerful about his meeting with Liz. That was actually not very difficult for him, when he pictured her beautiful and kind face before his inner eye.

He threw himself in the early-evening London traffic willingly with his ancient maroon Ford. And only when he noticed a slight cramping ache in his cheeks, he realized that he was smiling madly all the time.

As he had gone on his way quite early, he reached Liz's house with some minutes to spare, even though he had been stuck in some traffic jam.

Liz, who was dressed in a casual light blue blouse and black jeans, greeted Jack with a quick kiss on the cheek and he found himself blushing like a schoolboy.

"Hi, Liz. You look great," he told her. As he did not know what else to say, he asked her a little awkwardly, whether she was ready to go and soon they were on their way to Liz's favourite Italian restaurant. Fortunately Jack, eased up after a while, so they were chatting along happily about all kinds of stuff during the car ride.

The restaurant was in a small and comfortable basement room. The walls were made of bricks and dark polished wood, which glinted red in the light of the oil lamps and candles which lighted the room. Several dried flowers and spices hung on the walls for decoration. Liz and Jack found a table in the corner of the room and sat down. They did not have to wait long for the waiter to light the candle on their table and take their orders.

Jack ordered an extra large pizza with tuna and Liz had lasagne.

While they ate, they talked about everything that came up but again and again the topic of conversation returned to sports. Of course that was not surprising, as Liz was working for the sports section of her newspaper and Jack was going to become a P.E. teacher.

"So are you doing any sports yourself?" Jack asked, while he fought with some especially gooey cheese from his pizza.

"Yes, I go swimming – at least I try to go regularly. But with the job, it is sometimes a bit hard to squeeze it into my day. But I try to go to the pool at least two times a week," she smiled. "The times when I took part in competitions are long gone," she added a bit wistfully.

Jack nodded. "Yes, I know how it feels to never have enough time."

Liz cocked her head. "So what about you? Do you do any sports?" she asked curiously.

"Yes, Tae Kwon Do," he nodded. "I do quite a lot of it. And between that and my studies it's sometimes hard to find time for anything else."

"Tae Kwon Do?" Liz frowned. "Isn't that something like Karate?" she asked.

Jack smiled. "Well Tae Kwon Do and Karate are both Asian martial arts, so they do have things in common, but there are significant differences as well. First of all, Tae Kwon Do comes from Korea, whereas Karate is from Japan. The main difference in the sports itself is that in Tae Kwon Do, you work much more with your feet and legs than in Karate," he explained patiently. But Liz could tell that he had told the same thing to others many times before.

"So in Tae Kwon Do there are more kicks and in Karate there are more punches, right?" she asked. Jack chuckled. "Well, I suppose you could say it like that."

When they both had finished their meals, they leaned back contentedly. Jack stroked his belly and sighed. "I'm so full; I feel like I probably can't eat at all next week."

Liz just nodded, smiling and they sat in comfortable silence for a while, each in their own thoughts. After a few minutes, Liz looked up and saw a slightly worried and nervous expression on Jack's face. She had only seen this particular expression once in her "first" life on the face of James Potter and that was on the day before the try-outs for the English National Quidditch team.

Instinctively, she reached out for his hand. "What is troubling you, Jack?" she asked in a warm and concerned voice.

Jack sighed and looked in her bright green eyes. Then he shook his head. "It's just about my first physics lesson that I'm going to teach tomorrow," he said softly. "I don't feel properly prepared at all...you know...well, I know exactly _what_ I want to teach them, but I don't know _how_."

He looked up again and saw her frowning. "Well, that sounds silly, doesn't it?" he admitted with half a smile, half a grimace.

"What I mean is; when I was at school, lessons were only interesting when I had a nice conversation with my neighbour or someone was pranking the teacher. So now when I'm a teacher myself, how can I make the lessons be interesting for my students? I can't exactly let them prank me now, can I?"

Liz grinned mischievously at him. "Why don't _you_ prank _them_?"

Jack stared at her. "What? You do realize that my lesson will be supervised, don't you?"

Liz smiled appeasingly at him. "Oh, I don't mean really pranking them. Just make your lesson interesting and fun enough so that they forget pranking you. And isn't physics just the right subject for that with all its possibilities for experiments?"

Jack leaned back and frowned, while he thought about that. Then, quite suddenly, he sat up, his eyes widened excitedly and a wide smile spread across his face. "You know, Liz Hamrick, I could just kiss you right now!" he exclaimed.

Liz smiled back at him and there was a sly glint in her bright green eyes as she leaned towards him and said in a low, seductive voice, "Well, Jack Pearson, why don't you?"

November 3rd 1981

"Good morning, everyone," Jack greeted his students much more cheerfully than he felt.

Some of them replied murmuring, while others just nodded tiredly. When Jack looked in the faces of his twentythree fourteenyear-old charges, he mostly saw boredom, disinterest and tiredness.

But the one face that was unsettling him most with its serious and attentive look was the one of his mentor, Mr. Kenimer. The old Irish teacher would have reminded him of Professor McGonagall, if he could have remembered his life as James Potter at all.

Jack swallowed, plastered a smile on his face and asked, "Who of you would like to earn ten pounds in this lesson?"

Obviously, his words had an effect on some students, as a few heads, which formerly had rested on the tables, came up and looked at him curiously. Then after a while several students tentively raised their hands, much to Jack's relief.

He nodded. "Well, why don't all of you come up front here?" he told the class.

The classroom was suddenly filled with the noises of chairs scratching on the floor, footsteps coming to the front of the room and the curious murmuring of around two dozens of voices.

On the floor between the teacher's desk and the first row of the students' tables, they could all see a board, which was two feet long and one foot wide and which stood on four little wheels, so it looked almost like a very large and very plump skate-board.

Jack now put a ten-pound note about a meter away from the board and turned to the class. "Okay, the one who can jump with legs closed, from the board over the money, can keep it, alright? Who wants to try first?"

As this task seemed quite easy, and all of them would like to earn a little money with almost no effort, more than half of the students' hands shot up in the air. Now Jack smiled earnestly.

He picked out a scrawny boy with dark blond hair and freckles. "Okay, er what is your name?"

"Dennis," the boy told him, delighted that he could try first.

"Okay, Dennis," Jack said. "Stand on the board and then try to jump over the money, and it will be yours."

Smiling, the boys stood on it, bend his knees and then jumped forward with all his might, but to his surprise, he did not get forward at all, but the board shot out under his feet and crashed straight into the wall behind him, while he landed exactly on the same spot, he stood before – a meter away from the money.

Dennis looked around in astonishment. His classmates were looking at him and whispering, some laughing out loud, some of them boasting about how they could do it better and some wondering why Dennis could not do it.

On two or three faces, Jack could see an understanding smirk, and he smiled back at them conspirationally.

He let five more students try to jump, but when nobody could earn the money, he let them all take their seats again. Now of course the students were quite eager to know the reason for their failure to get the money and listened attentively, when Jack told them about the actio-equals-reactioprinciple and the two others of Newton's axioms.

Jack had so much fun teaching this lesson that he was almost sad when the bell told him that it was over. The students filed out of the classroom, smiling and waving at him, and Mr. Kenimer came forward, while Jack packed his stuff away.

He gave Jack one of his rare smiles and clapped him on the shoulder. "Good job, Mr. Pearson," he told him. "That was the most attentive I have ever seen this class."

Jack smiled at him, savouring the feeling of pride and success that was flooding him.

When he walked through the halls of the school, humming a tune, he felt like the happiest man on earth. His work was fun and successful and most of all, the most beautiful and lovely woman he had ever met had said yes when he had invited her for another date at the movies this evening and he just felt like he might have chances with this girl.

A/N: The next chapter will happen almost 7 years after this one. So stay tuned for "The Pearson Family"

Kabelkarsten and Jörg, thanks for beta-reading


	4. The Pearson Family

**Chapter 4 – The Pearson Family**

29th February 1988

"Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the British Airways flight number 4859 from Calgary to London. My name is Steven Linville and I will be your captain today. It is now 3.07 p.m. and we will arrive at the Heathrow Airport around 6.32 a.m. Enjoy your flight."

Liz leaned back in her seat and opened her seatbelt, now that they were up in the air. Through the small oval window to her right, she could see how the snow-covered houses and streets were already so small that they could be mistaken for ants. Soon the airplane had climbed so high that it was impossible for her to make out any details on the ground. It was just as if a white and grey blanket with few green and black spots was slowly drawn along beneath the plane.

Liz sighed and closed her eyes. When she opened them again after what felt like two minutes later, the sky around the plane was a deep velvety blue. She yawned and looked around. Her window was the only one that didn't have its shade down. Most of the other passengers were sleeping, although there were also a few that were watching some cheesy American movie on the little screen at the front of the cabin. Liz shook her head. _Am I really that tired? Well, I probably am_, she had to admit to herself. The last two weeks had probably been the most exhausting, but also most exciting in her career as a journalist. Who doesn't want to be at the Olympic Games!

Of course, Britain wasn't exactly a country which was known for winter sports. But still, she had found enough interesting stories to write about, for example about a bobsled team from Jamaica, which participated for the first time. They didn't win any medals, of course, but they won the respect and the sympathy of the spectators. She also quite enjoyed that there weren't too many of her British colleagues around, so she got the chance to work closer together with journalists from many other countries. And because the British competition wasn't too big, it was quite easy for her to get an exclusive interview with Wilfred O'Reilly, who won double Gold in the demonstration discipline short track. Otherwise, she had mostly been covering the figure-skating competitions, as Britain was fairly successful in them. In almost all of the ice-skating disciplines, there was a British athlete among the best fifteen.

Unfortunately, she didn't get any interviews with British winners of the "real" Olympic disciplines. But that was because the British athletes hadn't won in any of them at all this year.

Well, in this aspect, her co-worker Samantha would probably be luckier. She would cover the Summer Olympics in Seoul in about half a year. Liz could have gone there, too, instead of going to Calgary, but she wanted to spend the summer with her husband and children. And the twins were a little too young to take them along, and even if they weren't, she and Jack couldn't afford such a big trip. Although Jack would have been thrilled to spend two weeks in the home country of Tae Kwon Do.

The thought of her family made her smile. She had missed them so much that it hurt. It was the longest time she had ever been away from Amy and Leonard. She checked her watch and felt positively giddy now. In less than three hours, she was finally going to see them again.

Happy about that prospect, she took a family photo-album, which she had taken along to Canada out of her backpack. On the first pages there were pictures of her and Jack's wedding. They had married less than a year and a half after they first met at that fateful Halloween party. In two weeks, they were going to celebrate their fifth anniversary. It had been extremely strange to Liz to marry the same man twice. Even Jack had admitted to her that he had had a strong déjà vu, when they had been exchanging the rings.

Smiling, she turned to the next pages, which showed their honeymoon to Paris. On the picture, it was barely visible, but she had already been four and a half months along with the twins at that time. That was also the reason why they went on their honeymoon so early in spring and didn't wait till summer. But they really were lucky. The whole week they were in Paris the sun had been shining and they had fairly pleasant temperatures.

She chuckled softly at the memory of Jack telling her he would be faster climbing up the stairs of the Eiffel Tower than she taking the elevator. The most amazing thing was that he was right, but only because she had to stand in line for almost half an hour. So when she finally reached the top, she found Jack standing there, enjoying the view over the city and a large portion of strawberry ice-cream.

A few pictures of Jack and her in their new little house in Dawlish followed, her belly getting larger and larger. She and Jack had moved to this small town near Exeter, when Jack found a teaching job in the local high school there. Liz had stayed at home until the twins where about two years old and then went back to working part time at the sports section of the Exeter Express. Since almost a year ago, she had been working full time again, though.

Finally, she turned to the pages with the pictures of their children. They both had wild hair, which they had obviously inherited from their father. But while Amy's had the same raven colour as Jack's, Leonard had chestnut hair. Amy also had the same hazel eyes as her father, while her brother had green eyes, but not the same brilliant green as Liz. It was a dark forest-green instead. Liz sighed while she studied a picture of her son, taken at the twins' third birthday. He looked a lot like his older brother, whom he would probably never know.

Liz dreamed of Harry regularly. Most of the time, she just saw him sleeping in a very dark room, so she couldn't make out anything other than the small bed he was sleeping in. But sometimes he was awake, sitting with crossed legs on the shabby mattress and looking right at her with sad eyes that seemed way too large in his thin and pale face. He was so small and thin, he looked much younger than seven years. At those times, she always woke up crying softly and feeling extremely guilty and sad about her lost son. She wondered where he lived now. Was he still living with the Dursleys or with Sirius? Or had someone totally different taken care of him now. She had no way of knowing, because the only time she ever saw her son was at night. But whoever it was, she felt grave disappointment and anger with them, as Harry clearly looked neither healthy nor happy.

She was the lucky mother of two gorgeous children and loving wife of the best husband she could ever wish for, but one important part of her family was missing, and nobody apart from herself knew about that. Sometimes Liz envied Jack, because he had no memories of his old life, but at the same time she was glad that she could at least sometimes get a glimpse of Harry.

When the announcement was made that they would soon land in London, Liz put the photo-album away and fastened her seatbelt again.

To her, the landing of the plane and its rolling to the gate almost felt longer than the actual flight. Finally, the big air craft smoothly came to a stop and the people began to stand up, gather their bags and cloaks and annoyingly slowly filed out of the airplane. Liz was one of the last to leave the airplane, as she had sat in the back. But she was one of the first to reach the luggage belt. When she arrived at the hall, where the passengers could pick up their suitcases, the broad belt had just started to move and the first bags passed her. After what felt like an eternity, she saw the dark grey suitcase with a red bow attached to it. She had to admit it looked kind of silly, but at least she recognized her luggage on first sight and wasn't in danger of taking someone else's bag instead. And with more than three quarters of all bags being black or grey, that danger definitely existed.

Pushing these thoughts away, Liz grabbed her suitcase and with some effort, heaved it on a trolley. Finally, she headed towards the glass doors, which smoothly glided apart, when she came close to them. And behind the doors, she could see hundreds of people waiting to greet the passengers of her flight. Some serious looking men in neat suits held up signs with names on them and a group of teenagers waved a large colourful banner with balloons attached to it, which read "Welcome home, Sally."

Liz's eyes searched the crowd and it didn't take long for her to find a small boy and girl break through the front of people.

Only a moment later, both had jumped at her and were squealing delightedly. "Mum, you're home. We missed you, Mum."

Liz laughed while she bent down and gave both of her children a big hug, kissing them on the forehead. When she looked up, she could see Jack smiling down at the three of them.

Leo and Amy pulled back from their mom and turned excitedly to Jack. "Daddy, Mummy is home. Look, she's home," they told him.

Jack grinned at them and then took Liz in his arms and gave her a loving welcome kiss. The kiss didn't last long, though, as they both felt small hands pulling at their clothes.

"Mummy, look what I can do, Daddy showed me," Leo said proudly. Then he stood with his feet so far apart, that he could barely keep his balance. It was hard to decide whether he looked awkward or cute. His little face was screwed up in concentration as he started punching the air wildly.

After they had all watched him for some moments, Amy piped up.

"Leo, you're doing it wrong. It must look like this," she told him with a superior look on her face. Then she stood next to him and also started punching the air.

After a while, they both turned around almost at the same time and looked expectantly at their father.

Jack grinned down at them. "You're both doing great. Looks like I can soon teach you some kicks as well."

Both children were glowing with pride at the praise from their daddy.

"I see, you've taken them to the gym," Liz asked with an amused look on her face.

"Yes well, I could hardly leave them at home alone," he told her. "And they seemed to like it, too," he added with just a slight trace of defiance in his voice.

Liz laughed while she put her arms around his neck and gave him another quick kiss on the lips. "Of course, they liked it. How can they not like what the best daddy in the world does?" she whispered in his ear and grinned at him.

"I bet if you could ride on a broomstick, they would even do just the same," she added playfully.

Leo, who had heard the last sentence, turned to his father in awe. "You can ride on a broomstick, daddy?" he asked.

Jack chuckled and pretended to glare at Liz, while he said. "No, of course I can't, Leo. Mum is being silly."

Amy giggled at that and chanted, "Mum is being silly, mum is being silly," all the way to the car.

30th July 1991

Liz loved the odd years. When the number of the year was odd, there usually were no big sports events during the summer, such as Olympic Games, European Cups or World Cups in major popular disciplines. That meant that she could take some time off work during the school holidays, when Jack and the children were free as well.

Two days before, she, Jack and the twins had arrived in this sleepy little town at a small lake and they would stay here for one more week in a small and comfortable cottage right between the lake and a birch forest.

It now was late afternoon and the whole Pearson family relaxed after a long trip on their bikes. Liz was lying on her stomach in the soft grass, idly tearing apart some flowers, watching her children play. Jack was lying next to her, brooding over a crossword puzzle, a pen in his mouth.

Leonard and Amy were sneaking along the edge of the forest, pretending to be on a treasure hunt. The eightyear-old children loved to go on "expeditions" or on "rescuing missions" or whatever promised to be adventurous. Sometimes they played some scenarios from books they had read, or that had been read to them, but most of the time they developed their own plots.

A smile curled around Liz's lips as their voices carried over to her. "Watch out, Sir Lionel!" called Amy.

Leo ducked and turned around to his invisible attacker, kicking his foot high up in the air.

"Hah!" he cried smugly. "This will teach you to mess with the noble knights of Dawlish, you foul scoundrel!"

Then he turned to his sister and said casually, "Thank you, my brave Sir Andrew."

When playing their adventurous games, whether they were being knights, detectives, pirates or explorers, Amy never wanted to be a girl in them. As they had learned from the stories in their books, girls where only ever useful to be rescued from some evil guy or fantasy animal. But in Amy's opinion, running around, exploring and solving mysteries was, of course, much more fun than sitting around, waiting to be rescued.

Glancing over to her husband, Liz noticed that Jack had abandoned his crossword and was now watching his children, who were involved in another fight with many invisible enemies.

Jack had a proud look on his face as he commented under his breath: "Yes, Leo, that was a fantastic kick, only turn out your foot, you're standing on, a little further. Great combination there, Amy, but don't get too sloppy with your defence. Wow, I wouldn't have wanted to be in the way of that one..."

Liz chuckled, as she listened to her husband rambling on. But after a short glance on her watch, she interrupted him. "You know, we still need to gather some wood, if we want to do the campfire tonight."

"Oh, er, yes," replied Jack, coming out of his intense observations. "I'm sure the children would love to collect some wood," he grinned.

Leo and Amy must have noticed that they were the subject of their conversation, as they curiously came running over to their parents.

When they were close enough, Jack stood up and said with a deep and dignified voice, "Oh brave knights of Dawlish, You are only a few steps away of retrieving the treasure. If you solve the three tasks that I, the guard of the treasure, will set you, it will be yours, oh brave knights."

The eyes of the twins glowed with excitement.

"State your tasks, guard of the treasure," said Leo in a very authoritive tone, which clashed horribly with his high-pitched, young-boy voice.

"Very well, Sir Lionel. The first task will be to retrieve enough wood to build a campfire. Remember to only collect branches that lie on the ground."

Amy and Leo nodded eagerly and turned to run into the forest.

Liz was barely able to hide her amusement. "Well, guard of the treasure," she snickered, "What are the other two tasks, you are going to set them?"

"Oh, I thought of something fun, which provides for them to use their brain," he grinned and stood up. "But I need some things for this," he called over his shoulder as he went into the cottage.

A few moments later, he came back with two baking sheets, a large juice glass and a ping pong ball. He put the glass and the ball on a table on the porch of the cottage and carried the baking sheet over to the lawn. Then he picked up two long sticks and laid on of them close to the blanket that Liz was still sitting on, watching him curiously, and the other one parallel to it about a dozen meters away.

"So, everything is ready. Now we just have to wait for the knights to return," he said smugly, as he joined his wife on the blanket again.

"I suppose you aren't going to tell me what you have planned, are you?" she asked. Jack shook his head. "Nope. Two reasons," he said playfully. "Firstly, you're going to see it anyway in a few minutes and secondly, there are definitely better ways to spend the time waiting." He tilted his head to the side and looked expectantly at her. Liz held his gaze for a few seconds, quite amused how the expression on his face grew from a puppy-dog-look to a begging pout.

Finally, she gave in and leaned towards him, catching his lips with her own, drinking him in passionately.

Hearing soft giggling, they broke apart. Leonard and Amy stood proudly behind a large pile of branches, watching their parents.

Jack cleared his throat. "Oh, you're back. Good job, both of you."

Then he seemed to remember his role as guard of the treasure and continued to speak with a deeper voice. "You have successfully finished the first task, Sir Lionel and Sir Andrew," he said, nodding at them. "Are you ready to face the second task?"

"Yes, guard of the treasure, show us what we have to do," answered Amy.

Jack led them to the stick that he had placed on the lawn further away from the cottage earlier; the two baking sheets were still lying next to it. He picked them up and turned to the twins.

"Before you, you can see acid swamps. To reach the treasure you have to pass them. You are not allowed to touch the ground between here and the stick you see over there. Your only help will be those two magical shields. Use them well."

Leo and Amy eagerly took the sheets from him and started discussing, how to use them best.

"I know!" said Leo after a while. "Let's use them as giant skis. We both put one foot on each shield and slide along on them. Of course we need to take care that we make our steps at precisely the same time."

Amy looked sceptically back and forth between her brother and the baking sheets.

"Alright," she finally said reluctantly. "But let's try it on safe ground first, before we go out on the acid swamps."

Determinedely, they both stood on the sheets and started to practice sliding over the grass with them. Unfortunately, they never managed more than three or four steps until one of them stumbled and they lost the sheets from under their feet.

After more than a dozen unsuccessful tries, Leo shook his head. "That won't work," he stated. "We need to find another way."

For a while, they stared at the wide area of grass in front of them in silence.

"Of course!" cried Amy suddenly. "We were so stupid not to think of this immediately."

She explained to her brother what she had in mind and he hit his head with his flat hand.

Feeling confident about their new plan, Leo picked up one of the baking sheets and threw it about one step into the "acid swamp".

Then he slightly jumped on to it and Amy handed him the second sheet, before she joined her brother on the first one. It was a bit tight, but holding on to each other, they managed to keep their balance.

They threw the second sheet another half meter away, jumped on to it, turned around to pick the first one up and threw it in front of them again. In this fashion they had crossed the "dangerous acid swamps" in less than two minutes.

When they had reached the stick, which symbolized their goal line, they grinned at each other and shared a high five.

Then they both turned to their father again, eager to hear the third and final task.

Jack showed them the juice glass on the table. He had placed the ping pong ball in it. "This white pearl is the key to the treasure. If you can retrieve it without touching or moving the glass, nothing else will stand between you and the treasure."

While the children were staring at the glass, going around the table to look at it from all directions and trying to figure out how they could get the ball out of the glass, Liz appeared at Jack's elbow and asked him softly, "I know, you don't want to tell too much about your plans, but what exactly is the treasure the children are about to earn?"

Jack swirled around to her, his jaw hanging open. "Oh, damn," he muttered. "I knew that I forgot something."

"Language, Mr. Pearson," she scolded him playfully. "Well aren't you just lucky, that I still have a large box of ice cream and some fresh raspberries in the kitchen, which would do just nicely as a treasure."

"You save my life, Liz. You know that, don't you?" he said, grinning gratefully at her and giving her a big kiss.

Then they both turned their attention to the twins again, who were tentatively trying to reach the ball with some wooden sticks without touching the glass.

After some minutes of trying in vain to move the ball up in the small glass, Leo threw his stick away impatiently. "That doesn't work, Sir Andrew," he told his sister. "We have to find another way," he said, while he was looking around the area surrounding the cottage for some tools that might help in their mission.

Amy was lowering her stick now as well and followed her brother in searching another way to retrieve the ball.

She could see some thread lying in the corner of the terrace of the cottage. Maybe if they could somehow...

But while she was still trying to figure out how they could use the thread, Leo's eyes had fixed on the lake.

"Water..." he thought loudly. "That's it. It's so easy. We just have to fill the glass with water. The ball is so light, it will float on it, and we can easily take it out."

With a proud look on his face, he determinedly grabbed one of the empty lemonade bottles that stood in a plastic box on the porch and ran down to the lake to fill it up. Amy followed him excitedly.

They both returned to the porch in long dignified and self-confident strides, carrying the bottle with water as if it was a valuable ancient artefact that they had just discovered. When they passed their parents, they gave Jack a smug and meaningful look.

After making sure that their father was looking, Leo slowly filled the glass with water, and when the ball reached the top of the glass, Amy took it carefully and then thrust it up in the air, both twins crying out in triumph.

"Very well done, my brave knights," Jack said, while he beamed at his children. "You have solved all three tasks exceptionally well and are now allowed to follow fair Lady Elizabeth into the castle to retrieve the treasure."

So while Liz and the children went into the cottage to get the ice-cream, Jack started to set up and light the campfire.

It was a very pleasant evening for the Pearson family. The talked, sang and grilled marshmallows until late in the night. But eventually, the twins had to stifle yawn after yawn and Liz decided that it was bed time for them.

Now Liz and Jack were sitting by the fire by themselves. Liz had leaned her head on Jack's shoulder and Jack had laid his arm around her. They weren't talking much. It was just too special a moment, sitting there side by side by the fire, looking into the mesmerizing dancing flames, feeling the heat of them on their faces and the cool night air on their backs.

Liz felt comfortably tired and she snuggled closer into Jack as her eyelids became heavier and heavier...

_Liz was floating in the dark. Below her, she could see the body of a young boy, apparently sleeping. In the back of her mind she knew that she was having one of her Harry-dreams. But something was different tonight. For the lack of light she couldn't see, but she could feel it. Before she could further dwell on this thought, the room was bathed in bright light, and although it only lasted less than a second, it was enough for Liz to take in all the details of the room, her son was sleeping in. Two walls of the room consisted just of plain wooden planks, stained by humidity. The third wall was the same, except for a completely dust-covered window and a door, which hung crookedly in its frame. The fourth wall, to the right of the door, featured a large and empty fireplace. _

_The only furniture in the room was an old sofa with a moth-eaten blanket on it. On the sofa, there was the fattest boy Liz had ever seen. He was lying on his stomach, his mouth slightly open, drooling on his pillow. His left arm was hanging down limply. Liz wondered vaguely what the boy was doing in her dream, as she had never seen him before. Then she let her gaze wander to her son, who was lying on the bare floor, covered with a dirty grey rag, that had several holes in it. The storm that was obviously raging outside must have woken him up, as he was half sitting now, his elbows propped on the bare floor under him, supporting the weight of his upper body._

_Contrary to her previous dreams when Harry had been awake, he wasn't looking at her this time. Instead, his eyes where fixed on the wristwatch, which was attached to the dangling arm of the fat boy. The glowing digits just turned to 0:00._

_Suddenly, several things happened at once. The warped door was forced open violently; Harry's head jerked up and the fat boy fell from the sofa. It was really strange to Liz to witness all this without hearing a single noise._

_She followed Harry's gaze to the now-open door. She could make out the shape of an unnaturally large man, who seemed strangely familiar to her. When he stepped inside the cabin, Liz recognized him and would have smiled, had she had a body in her dreams. _

_She watched Petunia and Vernon Dursley rushing into the room and observed the events that unfolded in front of her eyes. Hagrid was making himself comfortable in the cabin and arguing with the Dursleys. But Liz didn't really pay attention to what she was seeing._

_She was seething at her sister. She had always suspected that Harry was still staying with her, but now she knew. How could she treat her little boy like that? How could she let him sleep on the floor, like an animal? She remembered the ridiculously small room she usually saw Harry in that resembled a cupboard rather than a room. But honestly, who would be so cruel to keep a child in a cupboard!_

_Liz's raging thoughts about her sister were interrupted when she saw how Hagrid pulled some parchment with green ink on it out of the folds of his cloak and handed it to Harry. Harry unfolded it and began reading, his eyes growing larger with every line of the letter._

Liz felt herself grinning and floating away slowly. _No! I want to stay! I want to watch him!_

But while she was still thinking this, she was already opening her eyes and found herself looking into the face of her dear husband.

Liz couldn't keep a happy smile on her face and her eyes shone as she whispered, "He's finally going to Hogwarts."

Jack stared at her. "Huh?" he made, caught in his watching her sleep.

Liz sat up eagerly. "Harry is going to Hogwarts," she was almost singing. "He's finally going to Hogwarts, isn't that great?"

Jack rubbed her back gently. "Yes, it is great, Liz. I'm sure, he will like it," Jack agreed in a very soft and patient voice. "Why don't you go to bed, while I'll be putting out the fire?" he whispered softly in her ear.

Liz looked in those amazing hazel eyes, while she began to understand that Jack couldn't possibly know what she was talking about and a wave of disappointment rolled through her.

She nodded silently and stood up to go inside.

But on her way into the cottage her lips curled into another proud smile. _Happy birthday, Harry. It is so great you're going to Hogwarts._


	5. MidSummer Night Dreams

**Chapter Five – Mid-Summer Night Dreams**

June 24th 1995

Jack came out of the bathroom, ready to go to bed. The night was still quite young – it was only 9:30 – but Jack was the only one in the flat who was still awake.

Liz had gone to bed very early tonight, because she would have to get up at three in the morning to drive to Wimbledon, where she had to cover the Grand Slam championship for the Exeter Express. Of course, she could have gone there already yesterday and spend the night there, but she wanted to watch the blue-belt exam of the twins today.

That was the reason why the children were already in bed. They were simply knackered. They had talked excitedly about their really successful exams until about twenty minutes ago. But then they were almost more yawning than talking and so they finally went to bed.

With a proud smile Jack remembered how the twins had performed. They had absolved the exam together at the same time, so they could show all the partner exercises, which they had practiced so often, almost perfectly. Then they had to go through their _poomsae_, the fight against the imaginary enemy. Leo's and Amy's poomsae didn't look quite so harmonic and fluent, instead they were full of energy and watching them one could really imagine that they were fighting against someone.

After that, of course, they had a real chance to show their skills, as they were fighting against each other. It was simply fun, watching them whirling around, letting their legs and arms fly. Lightly stepping, kicking, dodging, yelling. Afterwards, even the examiner had mentioned the excellent fighting skills of the twins.

The last task had also been no problem for his children. They each had to destroy a board, which measured one square foot and was half an inch thick, using a sideway kick.

Jack quietly opened the door to the twins' room and grinned. Both of them were already fast asleep. Smiling, he shook his head. It probably wouldn't take much longer until they could give him a run for his money, he thought, as he closed the door again.

Barefoot, he went along the short corridor and opened the door to his and Liz's bedroom quietly. He didn't turn on the light, because he didn't want to wake up his wife. But he was glad that the half moon was shining into the room, so that he could see enough.

A beam of blue-white moonlight fell like silk on the broad double bed, where Liz was already sleeping peacefully. She was lying half on her side, half on her back, facing Jack's part of the bed. Her red hair, which looked almost black in the dark room, was spread widely on the pillow, while a stray strand fell into her face, tickling her cheek.

Quietly, Jack went over to the bed and climbed in carefully. He lay down sideways, putting his weight on his right elbow. Gently, he reached over with his left hand and pushed the hair out of Liz's face, watching her lovingly.

Liz looked quite relaxed, although her eyes where moving wildly under her lids, indicating that she was dreaming. Suddenly, Jack felt apprehensive. What was she dreaming about? In the past four years, Liz had had some quite intensive dreams, from which she usually awoke bathed in sweat and totally confused. Jack guessed that not all of her dreams had necessarily been nightmares, but they definitely upset her.

It had all started during the summer holidays four years ago, when she fell asleep by the campfire, and then woke up with a start, grinning at him like mad and telling him that someone was finally going to some place with a strange name.

Jack shook his head about the memory. He hadn't thought much of it at that time, but after that, her dreams had recurred regularly. And usually, they were worst sometime in the middle of June, around the end of the schoolyear.

The first time, three years ago, Liz had been thrashing around in her sheets, screaming "Leave him alone! Leave Harry alone, you monster!"

Then she had woken up, sweaty and pale and wasn't herself for two days, until she apparently dreamed again two nights later and woke up with the words "Thank Merlin, he's alright. I've seen him again. He's alright," she had thrown herself on Jack's shoulder and cried out of relief.

Jack had comforted her, because she was obviously distressed about the dream, but he didn't dare ask her about it, this first time at least. He also wondered why she would say "Thank Merlin." She usually didn't say that, and why should she?

The following year, she had some of these dreams again, but never as bad as that first one. Until in June 1993 a similar extreme dream returned. This time, this Harry-fellow seemed involved in a fight against some kind of dangerous animal, against which he fought with a sword, as far as Jack could tell, from Liz's screams.

Jack had finally decided to talk to Liz about her nightmares, as they seemed pretty strange and he was very worried about his wife. But every time, he approached the subject, Liz skillfully changed the topic, so it was really hard for him to confront her about it. Once he tried to ask her directly and it had soon turned into a nasty row between the two of them.

Jack was feeling very worried and helpless. It frustrated him that the woman he loved suffered regularly at night, and he could do nothing against it. Furthermore, he would really like to know, who this Harry was who she kept screaming about in her sleep. He wasn't exactly jealous, as he could tell from the way she was dreaming about Harry that she cared for him, but there wasn't any romance. But he felt disappointed and hurt that Liz didn't trust him enough to tell him.

This secret that Liz didn't care to share with her husband began to slowly poison their relationship. Of course, they still loved each other, but once in a while in the morning, Liz stared defiantly at Jack, daring him to ask whether she had dreamed again, while Jack felt like he was walking on eggshells around her. The situation was really awkward. Luckily, the children hadn't noticed anything yet.

Jack sighed. The night almost exactly a year ago had been the worst yet. He himself had had a strangely realistic dream. He couldn't remember much of it, only the feeling of running on four legs. Although when he woke up from this dream, he didn't have the opportunity to dwell on it, as Liz was thrashing around in her sheets, her face so pale that it was more of a ghostly white, her hair sticking to her forehead, damp from cold sweat.

With a desperate and hysterical voice she kept screaming "Not Harry! Not Sirius! They are innocent! Leave them alone!"

It had been the first time, she ever mentioned anyone other than Harry. But Jack was sure that he had heard the name Sirius before, even though he knew nobody by this name.

Then Liz had awoken with a start, stared around in the dark bedroom as if she didn't realize where she was. She had been sitting like this for more than a minute, totally stiff, not moving, but shaking and shivering uncontrollably.

When Jack had finally dared to approach her cautiously, she had dived away from his hands and vomited over the edge of her bed. Even after she had emptied her stomach, she still had hung down from the edge of the bed with her upper body and was panting heavily.

Jack then had decisively grabbed her shoulders from behind and pulled her up gently.

"Liz, Liz, tell me what happened," he had whispered softly in her ear, while he had cradled her in his arms and rubbed her back.

Liz had sobbed in his shoulder and rambled about things Jack hadn't understood, upset and shocked of her dream.

"Oh, Jack, ...the dementors attacked them...they are going to suck out their souls...Sirius looked so horrible...and Harry, he is only thirteen, what did they want with him?"

Jack had continued rubbing her back and whispering caring and calming words in her ear. He was worried sick about the increasingly worse nightmares of his wife and he wanted to ask her who Harry and Sirius were, but not now. Now it was most important that Liz knew that he was there for her and that everything would be fine. But ask her, he would.

A year had gone by and Jack still didn't know what Liz lived through during her nightmares, neither did he know who Harry and Sirius were. There had been quite some arguments between him and Liz, but as his wife was at least as stubborn as he was, it was almost impossible to get her to talk about something she didn't want to talk about.

Jack shook his head and sighed. In fact, the whole last year had been relatively quiet concerning Liz's dreams, except that one time in February, but that night she didn't seem too worried, more reproachful and even a little amused, while she had talked about tricky stairs and eggs.

But Jack couldn't help feeling uneasy about this time of the year. Still he almost hoped that if Liz really had to dream again, she would do tonight. So he would be there for her afterwards. He hated for her to have such terrible nightmares, being all by herself in some lonely hotel room at Wimbledon.

Jack shifted into a more comfortable position and, although he was still a little worried, slowly drifted off to sleep.

_...He was falling through absolute darkness. It wasn't even black; it was just nothing, as if he was blind. His body felt utterly weightless. He couldn't even tell whether he was falling down or sideways or even up. It was a strange and uncomfortable feeling and he hated it, that he had no control – neither over the direction in which he was moving nor over any of his body movements._

_It all stopped abruptly, as he was bathed in bright golden light and a sound that was unbelievably beautiful. It was like singing and like the sound of a large bronze bell at the same time and it filled him with indescribable power and happiness._

_After a while, his eyes had adapted to the sudden brightness and now he could see the shape of some persons in front of him. They were no real persons, they just seemed to consist of some sort of golden smoke. He looked at the closest one, as he still couldn't move. It was an old man, who he had never seen before. "He was a real wizard, then?" he said towards a person who Jack couldn't see. "Killed me, that one did...you fight him boy..."_

_Jack had a feeling that it was of utter importance to know who this old man was talking to. So he craned his neck, but all he could see was the golden shape of a woman, who seemed vaguely familiar to him – Bertha Jorkins. But how he knew her name, Jack had no idea._

"_Don't let go now!" the strangely familiar woman cried. "Don't let him get you, Harry – don't let go!"_

_**Harry!** That name rang a bell! But before he realized what that name meant to him, he felt as if he was pressed through some narrow hose. It was a similar feeling to apparating. He propelled forward and fell on his hands and knees. As he looked up, he took in the scene in front of him. _

_He could now see a boy with raven hair, not unlike his own, and glasses – Harry, his son! _

_The boy had a determined look on his face, while he held a wand raised in front of him. Even though James, he could now remember his own name, couldn't see what Harry was facing, as it was behind him, he knew. He could feel the presence of his own murderer – Voldemort, who was now threatening to murder his son as well._

_James wasted no time standing up and, instinctly knowing what he had to do now, stepped forward. "Your mother is coming..." he quietly told Harry. "It will be all right...hold on..."_

_While he was waiting for the arrival of his wife, Lily, he took in his surroundings._

_They stood on what seemed to be a large graveyard, as there were several tombstones surrounding them. Through the golden mist, which was caused by some peculiar connection between Voldemort's and Harry's wands and which formed a dome above them, he could see about thirty figures in cloaks and masks – deatheaters._

_On a hill to his left, James could see a manor house, which propably had been gorgeous some centuries ago, but now looked abandoned. Right next to an open grave in front of him stood a big cauldron, which was still steaming. _

_He had no idea, how his son managed to get himself in such a dire situation, but he had no time to think about that now, as Lily was falling out of the wand and joined him._

_After smiling at him weakly, she stepped forward determinedly and whispered into Harry's ear, "When the connection is broken, we will linger for only a moment...but we will give you time...you must get to the portkey, it will return you to Hogwarts...do you understand, Harry?"_

"_Yes," Harry gasped, as he now had to fight hard to hold on to his wand, which threatened to glide through his fingers._

_James heard one of the shadowy figures next to him speak. It was a boy, barely older than Harry. He sounded sad, as he whispered, "Harry, take my body with you, please. Take it back to my parents..."_

_James realized that this boy must have died only some minutes ago and looked around again. And sure enough, his body was lying only a few meters away from the large cauldron. More determined to get his son out of here than before, James turned to Harry again._

_Harry's face was twisted with the effort to hold on to his wand as he promised the boy to do what he had asked._

"_Do it now," James whispered. "Be ready to run...do it now..."_

"_Now!" Harry yelled, as he forced up his right arm. The golden light and the wonderful sound, which James had meanwhile recognized as the song of a Phoenix, died away. Without wasting another minute, James, Lily and the other shadowy figures, which had been victims of Voldemort, built a tight circle around the dark wizard to separate him from Harry._

_As James had told Harry, Voldemort couldn't get through. But his deatheaters, James and the others couldn't influence. They were throwing curse after curse after Harry, who ran as fast as he could towards the portkey while he dodged the many beams of light, which were coming from the wands of the deatheaters. _

_James could only hope that they wouldn't reach him, but he couldn't watch his son's flight, as his back was turned towards him. _

_Voldemort was now yelling at his servants "Stupefy him! Stupefy him!"_

_Behind him, James could hear, as if from very far away, how his son sent an impedimenta-jinx against one of his attackers. _

No_, he thought, _he looses time if he gets involved in a fight!_ But James couldn't do anything but hope that Harry would reach the portkey, as he felt how the world around him began to dissolve. _

_Paler and paler grew the graveyard around him and now he saw Voldemort moving towards him and walk right through him. Finally, he was floating through darkness again..._

Jack awoke with a start. It was dark around him and for a moment he did not know where he was and what he was doing here. Then the memories of his dream came tumbling into his head – _Lily_ – _Voldemort_ – _Harry_.

_Harry!_ Jack sat up suddenly. _Did he make it? Did he, Lily and the others give him enough time to escape? _

Those worrisome thoughts ran through Jacks mind as he remembered more and more details of his dream.

Or had it really been a dream? It had seemed so real. But how could it be real? Jack had no son named Harry and his wife's name was Liz, not Lily.

Jack shook his head to clear his thoughts. It was quite hard to think straight right after waking up. Then, like a hammer, realization hit him and his eyes widened in shock.

Liz's dreams…could it be? But how?

Mechanically, he turned around in bed to switch on the light on his bedside table. Then he slowly turned towards his wife and found her sitting in bed as well, staring at him with wide eyes, fine beads of sweat covering her pale face.

It was only then that Jack realized that he, too, was drenched in cold sweat and shivering, while his sheets were lying on the floor next to the bed. But that did not matter right now.

"Did…did you…?" he croaked.

Even though he could not finish the question, Liz seemed to know exactly what he meant, as she nodded slowly, never taking her wide, unblinking eyes off his face.

"It wasn't a dream, was it?" Jack whispered, knowing the answer already, but still fearing that he was right.

Liz nodded again, then suddenly threw herself around his neck and cried hard into his shoulder. After she had cried silently for many long minutes, she mumbled something into the pit of his arm, her voice still being choked by occasional sobs that escaped her throat. So Jack had to strain his ears to make out her words.

"Oh James…knew all the time…fourteen years…missed him so much…couldn't tell anybody…"

Jack held her tightly and rubbed her back gently, while she continued rambling.

"I know, Lily, I know", he whispered softly in her ear.

Lily stiffened in his arms and suddenly drew back from his embrace.

James could now see her face, which first showed surprise, than she was looking at James, as if she now saw him for the first time, but finally a warm and loving smile lit up her face. She leaned towards him again, but this time she caught his lips with hers and drew him into a long and passionate kiss.

James felt like he was flying. That kiss was so special – so honest. There was nothing between them now. No secret, no worry that the other wouldn't understand. They both knew now.

Reluctantly, James ended the kiss and leaned back to look at his wife. He realized that he hadn't really looked at her like this for so many years.

She was older now than when they met, almost fourteen years ago, but just as beautiful. There were lines in her face now; the most prominent were the smile lines around her mouth and eyes. James really loved those, but he could also see the two thin horizontal lines across her forehead. She worried too much.

James knew now who she worried about, and he felt guilty, because for such a long time, she couldn't share this worry with him, and he couldn't ease her burden.

"Do you think he made it?" Lily interrupted his thoughts.

James knew, of course, that she meant Harry. "I'm sure, he did," James whispered and managed to sound more confident than he felt. "He's our son, after all," he added proudly.

Lily sighed. "He just has to survive," she muttered. Then she looked sharply up at James again. "Do you remember the prophecy?"

James remained silent and his eyes glazed over, while memory after memory of his old life crossed his mind. Going to Hogwarts, becoming friends with Sirius, Remus and Peter, finding out that Remus was a werewolf, becoming animagi, dating Lily, marrying Lily, becoming father…and then there was it.

He remembered how Dumbledore had visited them and urged them to go into hiding, after a prophecy about Harry had been made. Dumbledore had taken out a pensieve, which showed the seer, who spoke in a rough and unearthly voice:

_'The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches ... born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies ... and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not ... and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives ... the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies ...'_

James came out of his reverie and looked his wife intensively in the eye. "Yes", he said seriously. "Yes, Lily, I remember everything now."

A/N: Everyone, who loves the twins as much as I do, will be looking forward to the next chapter "Like Father, like Son (and Daughter)"

I want to thank my wonderful betas Jörg and Kabelkarsten


	6. Like Father like Son and Daughter

**Chapter 6 – Like father like son (and daughter)**

"But there has to be a way to get back," said James for at least the twentieth time within the last hour.

Within the last week, since he had had the dream which made him remember his former life, he had said this sentence probably more than a thousand times.

Lily knew exactly how her husband felt as she had felt the same way fourteen years ago.

"James," she said gently, "there are no wizards in this world. Magic doesn't exist here. I see no chance we can get back under these circumstances."

James turned towards her abruptly, a desparate glow in his eyes. "But there has to be a way. I mean there definitely is a connection between the two worlds, otherwise we wouldn't dream about it, right?" James begged her to agree with him with his eyes. "I'm sure that together, we'll find a way back."

Lily sighed. She did not have much hope of ever getting back and she did not want to get her hopes up by again trying to return to her world only to be disappointed once again. They were dead in their own world. But she did not have the heart to rob James of his hope, not yet.

So instead of answering his question, she stood up. "It is getting late, why don't we go back to the hotel?"

Lily had a long day of working behind her as she wrote for her newspaper, the Exeter Express, about the tennis championships in Wimbledon. The tournament lasted for two weeks so there was still a week left. James and the twins had been visiting London for a few days while she was here. But of course they only had time to spend together during the evenings as she was working during the day.

Usually, they spent the evenings talking about their memories of their "other life" as they were calling it now. When they were alone, they liked to think of themselves as Lily and James again because it felt right. But of course in their public everyday-lives they still went by Jack and Liz. They talked about their own time at Hogwarts and the Marauders but they also speculated how their world would look like now. Both of them were very concerned about their son Harry although Lily had dreamt of him again and so they knew that he had survived his encounter with Voldemort. Of course the topic of getting back to their world came across their conversation again and again.

Tonight Lily and James had taken a walk in the cooler evening air while they had left the twins to play in the hotel swimming pool.

"So what did you do with the kids today?" Lily asked to stir the conversation on easier ground.

"Oh, we went to the zoo. Leo was so fascinated of the lions and told everyone who wanted to hear it that his name meant lion," he smiled.

Lily laughed. "Oh, I can imagine how Amy reacted to that." She put her nose up in the air and said in a slightly superior voice that was a good imitation of her daughter's. "Well, you know, lions are actually really lazy. They sleep most of the time and when they don't sleep, they eat. So it's actually quite a boring animal"

Now James joined her laughing. "Yes, you know your daughter quite well. That is pretty much what she said to that. But of course Leo, wasn't really impressed by that. For him it was enough that the lion is seen as king of the beasts."

For Jack, the rest of the summer passed in a blur of family activity, which he appreciated much more since his dream in June. He was also doing a lot of research. He was determined to find some way to get back in his own world.

As soon as he and the twins had come home from their London trip, Jack had installed a modem in their house so he could use the internet for his research.

Liz had helped him a lot with gathering information and especially her experience as a journalist was very useful. But so far they had not found anything that would help them to get back. Despite Liz's doubts and despite their lack of success, it felt good to do something which hopefully brought them closer to their own world – and most of all, to do it together.

They had begun their quest for a way back at the pub where they had "met" on Halloween 1981 and tried to determine whether there were significant wizard premises nearby in their other world but apart from an apparition point there was nothing of importance.

They had also tried to contact others who had died in the wizarding world. So far they had only found an old woman who Lily remembered had worked in the robe shop in Diagon Alley, but the lady had of course no memories at all about her life as a witch.

August turned into September and Jack had to start teaching again, which now of course occupied most of his time. The twins had turned twelve years this summer and began at the secondary school where James was teaching. Fortunately, they did not have any lessons with him as James was afraid that this would be awkward for him as well as the children.

It was now the end of October and Leo and Amy sat in one of their favourite classes – physics with Mr. Carpenter. Jonathan Carpenter was a year younger than their father and the two of them were good friends, so he had visited the Pearson family home quite often. The twins liked him a lot and in their opinion, he was simply cool. He had a great sense of humour and his lessons were never boring as he liked practical experiments in his class at least as much as Jack did.

The lesson was almost over and Mr. Carpenter cleared his throat. "Well, I think it's time for the Deal of the Week again, isn't it?" he asked his students, smiling.

Twenty-three heads nodded eagerly. Mr. Carpenter was the only teacher who had managed the students to be looking forward to him giving them homework.

The Deal of the Week consisted of him giving some tasks for his students to do at home while he usually announced some interesting sounding experiment, which he would show them in their next lesson.

"How about this? You read pages 46 to 49 in the book and calculate the velocity of the cars in the examples, which the text gives, with the formula you have learned today. "

He waited for the students to write down the task in their calenders before he continued. "So next Wednesday I'm going to show you how I have a bucket of water, which is turned up-side-down, over my head without getting wet."

Leo and Amy looked excitedly at each other. They knew this experiment. Their dad had shown it to them during the summer holidays.

"Well, he will only not get wet if the bucket keeps moving; what do you say we stop it when it is right over his head?" he whispered to his sister mischievously. Amy grinned.

"That would be really funny; too bad we can't just do something like that." But Amy did not sound too sad while saying that, instead she giggled about her imagination of the wet physics teacher.

Leo looked thoughtful for a moment before his eyes started to glow excitedly.

"Well, why not? I have an idea how we can do it. We just have to plan it thoroughly."

Amy, who knew her brother quite well, knew that he would think about nothing else than this prank until next physics class.

As the bell signalled the end of the lesson, the twins slowly left the classroom, the plan of a prank beginning to form in Leo's head while Amy kept throwing him curious glances.

Wednesday couldn't approach quickly enough for Leo and Amy. Over the weekend they had planned everything they wanted to do carefully and they felt lucky that the physics lesson on Wednesday was right after lunch break. They skipped their lunch to prepare the classroom for the show.

They drewa long line of string across the ceiling of the classroom and knotted an old net, in which Leo usually kept his football, on one end of it. The net stayed hidden behind the blackboard until the twins, who would sit on the desk in the back of the room, pulled the string so that the net would hang right above their teacher.

The physics classroom was perfectfor this kind of prank as the ceiling was covered with checked panels to cover the lamps so the string was not easily seen against those.

The preparation took Amy and Leo the better part of their break and after they were ready they did not have any time to go to the school cafeteria to grab some lunch. So they just went into the corridor outside of the classroom to talk with some friends.

A few minutes before their lesson started they saw their dad coming towards them with some books under his right arm and carrying a small plastic bucket in his left hand.

Leo stared at him. "What are you doing here, dad?" he asked, totally confused. Jack grinned at him. "I'm going to teach you," he answered simply as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Amy, who had joined her brother, sputtered "What? But where is Mr. Carpenter? It's his lesson."

Jack frowned at his daughter. He knew that the children liked the lessons with his friend, but that did not justify the almost panicked reaction from them. "He is a little under the weather and I'll be substituting for him today," he said and watched the twins suspiciously.

Amy forced a cheerful expression on her face as she said, "Oh, well I'm sorry to hear that; I was just curious why you were teaching today."

Jack threw one more suspicious glance at the twins and entered the classroom, in which he also looked around carefully, but still he did not notice the string on the ceiling before he set the books on the teachers desk.

Leo's eyes were still on his father as he mouthed "What now?"

Amy grinned at her brother. "We'll do it anyway," she decided as they took their seats in the back of the classroom.

Jack, who suspected that his children were up to something, threw glances at them throughout his whole lesson. He knew that they had a very Marauder-sense of humour at home; but he had never heard of any of his colleages that his children were too out of line in class. And surely they would not start today, would they?

Finally, he came to the experiment, Jonathan had asked him to show the students. He filled the plastic bucket with water at the sink in the front of the class room and when he returned to the teacher's desk, he caught the faces of Amy and Leo, who now looked perfectly innocent.

Feeling a bit as if he was walking into a trap as he explained the experiment to the class, James slowly and carefully began swinging the bucket in front of him before he started to let the water-filled bucket make loopings over his head. After about three loops his students were cheering loudly and James wanted to take the bucket down in relief, when it suddenly caught right over his head and its contents showered all over his hair, face and shirt.

Jumping in surprise, James looked up over his head and saw a wet ball net dangling above him, which he had already seen several times in the room of his children.

Through the loud laughter of the class, James brought his arm down and closed his eyes, while he leaned his head back and breathed in deeply to calm himself.

After a glare, which he shot at the twins, he continued the lesson with a calm and firm voice. "Well, that, what most of you witnessed with great amusement now, was a brilliant example for a combination of a circular movement and an abrupt negative acceleration..."

The physics lesson went on without further incidents, even though Jack's hair was still dripping wet, and when the bell rang the students packed away their books and began shuffeling out of the classroom, chatting excitedly about this great prank and Jack knew that they were only waiting to get out of his hearing range, before they burst out laughing about it.

"Wait just a second!" called Jack after the children. "Amy and Leonard Pearson, I would like to see you in my office after school is out today," he said sternly to his son and daughter.

The twins nodded with expressions on their faces that Jack interpreted as Oh-well-it-was-worth-it. He had worn this expression quite often in his own school days and smiled inwardly as he returned to his office to change clothes before the next lesson.

When the twins stepped into their father's office at four o'clock in the afternoon that day, they felt a bit apprehensive about what would meet them there. After all it was the first time they were about to get detention in their new school, and it was their own father giving it to them.

Jack Pearson was sitting behind his desk and was grading some testpapers. When he noticed his children entering his office he looked up, his face void of any emotion.

Considering their prank in his class today, Leo and Amy were quite unsure what to expect of their father and teacher now. Had they gone too far? They knew that Jack would have laughed about it, had they just done it in the garden behind their house, but now? Did he feel compromised in his authority? Was he really mad at them?

Amy and Leo had not thought about any consequences their prank would have either on them or on their father. Now, as they saw him, staring expressionless at them, they both felt some guilt creeping up in their consciences and suddenly they found their shoelaces extremely interesting.

"Well, why don't you come in and take a seat?" Jack flatly invited his son and daughter in.

Amy and Leo walked in carefully and sat in two chairs in front of the full desk of their father.

Between stacks of testpapers and essays, which were waiting to be corrected, there were many framed pictures of Leo and Amy, and a bowl filled with candy and chocolate. Jack used to say that he needed energy while doing paperwork, and most energy could be found in sugar.

The twins had been in this office quite often already and usually they liked it a lot, because it was the only room they knew of that was more chaotic than their own bedroom.

There was only a thin corridor of floor cleared between the door and the desk. Everywhere else in the room stood different wooden and metal structures, used for all kinds of physical experiments. The spaces between them were filled with masses of books, whereas the walls of the relatively small office were plastered with family pictures, diagrams and Tae Kwon Do posters.

Despite the apparent chaos, the room usually had a light and friendly atmosphere to it, but at the moment, Amy and Leo could feel the tension in the air.

The silence stretched on while Jack was sitting behind his desk, looking at his children, who were now sitting opposite their father and still did not dare look at him.

So of course, the twins did not see how Jack's lips started twitching and soon curled into a small smile. He put a final effort into concealing it again before he spoke in the sternest voice he could manage. "You know, why you are here, don't you?"

Amy and Leo looked up and Jack could immediately see that Leo didn't like the tone in his question at all, as the expression on his face rapidly changed from guilt to defiance.

"Yes, _sir_," he answered stifly while Amy only stared at him.

"Bet you don't," said Jack simply and was proud of himself, that he still did not give in to the urge to smile.

Leo leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms in front of his chest and said in a tone that teachers usually do not like at all (but Jack did not mind at the moment), "Well, and why are we here?"

Now Jack could not stop himself any longer and grinned broadly at his children. "I wanted to congratulate you," he told them cheerfully.

Amy, who had just opened her mouth to defend herself and her brother, closed it again.

"What?" she asked disbelievingly while she and Leo looked at their father as if he had grown an extra head.

"I wanted to congratulate you," he repeated himself. When he saw, that the twins were still staring wordlessly at him, he continued. "Congratulation on your successful prank. You really had me there."

Amy was first to regain her speech. "You...you mean, that we don't get detention?" she asked carefully.

"No, of course not!" said Jack. "I and my friends from school always prided ourselves to be the worst pranksters of the world. How could I now punish the first promising sign you show to be worthy successors!" he exclaimed dramatically.

Leo and Amy laughed loudly, from the antics of their father and teacher, as well as out of relief that their behavior in their physics lesson was thousand times more appreciated by their dad than they could have ever hoped for.

"Why didn't you ever tell us, Dad?" Amy wanted to know. "I mean, you never have told us anything about your own time at school."

Leo nodded eagerly.

Jack thought for a moment. "Well", he said somewhat like a child being caught with their hand in the candy jar. How could he have told his children about his memories, when he only found them back himself half a year ago? And his school days as Jack Pearson had been less than a shadow of his school days as James Potter.

Then he caught himself. "You see, I didn't want to give you ideas, especially as I don't think your mother would like that. But now that you seem to have a great prankster potential yourselves, why don't we use your 'detention' to make up for that now? Let me get some hot chocolate for all of us, and then I can tell you about my glorious days as a Marauder."

A/N: Some interesting information, the twins got there, didn't they? What are they going to do with them? Find out in chapter 7 "The Twisters"

I want to thank my wonderful betas Kabelkarsten and Jörg


	7. The Twisters

**Chapter 7 – The Twisters**

The ringing of the phone interrupted Jack in his story about Padfoot, the big, black dog of his best friend Sirius, and how he scared Sirius's superstitious cousin Narcissa senseless, because she thought it was an omen of death.

Somewhat irritated about the interruption, Jack picked up the phone – and went bright pink when he heard who had called.

"James, the children haven't come home yet. Have you seen them at school? They are never that late without telling me where they are..." came the concerned voice of his wife from the receiver.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Lily," he exclaimed. "They are with me. They came to see me after class today." He winked at his children and mouthed, "It's Mum." He didn't notice the puzzled glance the twins exchanged.

"James!" she said angrily. "You could have called me. You don't know how worried I was!"

"Honestly, Lily. I'm very sorry. I didn't want you to worry, I just forgot," Jack admitted somewhat downcast, but then his face lit up boyishly. "Look," he said with a disarming smile on his face, which Liz could not see of course. "You should be really proud of me for taking some parental responsibilities seriously, shouldn't you?"

"The children didn't get into any trouble, did they?" she asked suspiciously. Jack threw an alarmed glance at his children. He knew better than to tell Liz of their little episode in the physics lesson, and especially how he had been handling it afterwards.

"Oh, er, everything is alright. I just decided that it was time for an important father-to-kids-talk."

"Uhuh," said Liz, obviously not really convinced. Then she sighed. "Why don't you three come home for dinner? It's already quite late."

Jack grinned at the phone when he answered. "What a brilliant idea. See you in twenty minutes. Love you."

While Jack packed his stuff in his bag and locked his office, the twins were already racing to the car. Amy was a bit faster and got to sit in the front seat.

Thinking about Liz's possibly not so happy reaction, if she had known how he had been dealing with the twins after their prank, Jack realized that she was probably right. He hadn't been handling this situation very maturely. He was not the marauder Prongs anymore, but a father and a teacher, who was supposed to act responsibly. As funny as his children's prank had been, he shouldn't have encouraged them to continue this kind of behavior openly. _I probably didn't make many friends among my colleagues today_, he sighed inwardly.

Determined to undo at least part of the damage he had caused, Jack turned around in the driver's seat to face Amy and Leo, before he started the car.

"There is something else about practical jokes you absolutely need to know," he began. "As funny and creative I found your prank today, as a teacher I cannot tolerate another one. If I or any of your other teachers find out about any more trouble making, you will have to bear the consequences, understood?"

"Yes, Dad," Amy and Leo answered in unison, but when their father turned his attention to the road, they shared a secretive grin.

After riding in silence for a few minutes, Leo leaned forward between the seats of his father and sister and asked, "Why did you call Mum Lily?"

Jack glanced quickly in the mirror to see that Leo was looking at him curiously. "Well, that was her nickname at school."

Jack had the feeling that he had not convinced his son and Amy was looking at him somewhat doubtfully as well. He was annoyed with himself about his slip of tongue. But to his relief, Leo did not ask about it any further.

Instead, Amy asked now, "Did Mum like your friends when you went to school?"

Jack looked a bit surprised for a second, but then he answered. "Well, I guess by the time she liked me, she was pretty much used to the others as well. Sometimes, when all four of us were together, we could quite get on her nerves, though," he smiled.

"But then why have your friends never visited us?" Amy wanted to know. Her Dad's friends really seemed like the sort of people who could teach her and her brother quite a lot of fun. And judging her brother's face, she was not the only one who would like to get to know them.

_That's a fair question, isn't it?_ Jack thought, sighing. "Not all friendships last forever," he replied quietly and sadly. "One of my three friends, Peter, betrayed your mother and me and by doing so, he robbed me of my two other friends."

Not quite knowing how to respond to this, the twins remained silent for the rest of the way home.

"Don't you think Dad acted a bit odd today?" Amy was sitting on the upper part of the bunk bed, dangling her legs, as she watched her brother pack some books and folders he would need for tomorrow's lessons in his schoolbag.

Leo turned around to her. "Yeah, I was surprised that we didn't get into trouble for that stunt," he admitted.

"Well, that too," nodded Amy, "but that wasn't what I meant. He became so nervous when you asked him why he had called Mum 'Lily.'"

Leo put his bag aside and sat down on the desk, one of his feet on the chair, the other one hanging down freely. He furrowed his brow and nodded.

"That's strange. I've never heard him call Mum 'Lily' before," he mused.

Then he shrugged. "But maybe, if it's what she was called at school, he just did it because he had been talking about all his memories."

"Yeah, maybe." Amy didn't really sound convinced. "But I'm sure there is something he is not telling us," she considered. "Come to think of it, he has been a bit secretive ever since last summer, locking himself in his study for hours on end. I wonder what he has been doing there."

"Do you really think one thing has to do with the other?" Leo asked a bit doubtfully.

Amy shrugged and crawled over to the window to open it for the night, then she turned around halfway. "We could try to find out," she said non-commitedly.

Leo nodded enthusiastically. "That is exactly what the Marauders would have done, isn't it?" He threw his blanket on his sister's bed and joined her, as it was now getting quite cold in the room.

"I know what we can do," he said with sparkling eyes. "We continue the noble work of the Marauders; we do everything in our power to make school more interesting by playing pranks and we uncover secrets, experience adventures, and maybe we can even meet the rest of the real Marauders one day," he ranted on.

Laughing openly about her brother's antics, Amy replied, "Well, let's do first things first. If we want to be worthy successors of the Marauders, we need to come up with a good plan." She pretended to lecture him seriously about that, but her laughing eyes betrayed her. "Oh, and we need to come up with a name as well," she added.

They grinned at each other, each in their own fantasies, how much fun the Marauders must have had when they were their age, and how much fun they could have themselves.

Suddenly, Leo jumped from his cross-legged sitting position to his knees. "I have an idea!" he exclaimed. "Do you think that Dad would talk with Mum about his school memories today? I mean, he was really engaged in his memories today and he and Mum probably share some of the same memories, so he would probably talk to her about it, wouldn't he?"

Amy chewed on her lower lip, as she thought about that. "So you suggest that we eavesdrop on them?" she asked slowly and with notable reluctance.

"Well, we could at least try. If they are talking about something else, we can leave them alone," he tried to convince not only his sister, but also a little voice in his own head which reminded him that it was not exactly nice to listen in to other people's talking.

"Or we could just ask them when they come and say goodnight," Amy suggested.

"Yeah, as if they would tell us anything," Leo rolled his eyes. "Didn't you see how uncomfortable Dad was with the topic?"

Amy threw him a nasty look and Leo threw up his arms defensively. "Okay, let's listen to them first, and then we can still ask them, can't we?"

Inside Amy, her curiosity was struggling with her conscience, but finally she nodded. "Okay, let's go then." Gracefully, she jumped down from the bed.

The bare feet of the twins made funny noises on the polished wooden floor in the corridor of the Pearsons' house. They sneaked to the closed door of the living room, behind which they could hear the muffled voices of their parents.

"Who was it?" they heard their mother say.

Obviously, Jack had just finished a phone call. "Oh, it was Jonathan," he answered. "He's feeling better and will come back to teach tomorrow."

"You taught his class today, the one the children are in, didn't you? How was it?" she asked curiously.

Jack sighed and let himself fall backwards on the sofa, next to his wife.

Liz chuckled and put her arms around his shoulder. "That bad, huh?"

Jack pulled back slightly to look her in the eyes, then he smiled and admitted, "Well, actually it was quite funny. The only problem was that I was on the receiving end of a practical joke of the children."

"So, that's why they stayed with you in your office after school. Did they serve detention with you?"

Trying to avoid the topic, without actually lying to his wife, Jack stuttered, "Er – well – I – I warned them – and told them, next time it would be detention..."

Liz looked at him expectantly, not missing a beat. "And what was it this time?" she prompted finally, after he didn't say anything for a while.

Knowing how Liz would react to the answer of this question, Jack braced himself. "I told them about the Marauders."

"James, you didn't!" she exclaimed.

Jack slumped deeper into the sofa. "I know," he snapped a bit huffily."I'm sorry, I didn't quite feel like myself today," he said more placably. "It's just, they reminded me so much of how Sirius and Remus and I were at school...after that, I already realized that I should have acted more like a teacher than like Prongs," he ranted.

"James, I understand," Liz said quietly and leaned on him. "And actually, I'm not so much concerned about that. I mean, you turned out right, after all of your pranks at school, didn't you?"

Jack was totally taken by surprise. He had expected any reaction from Liz, but not that.

"But we have to be careful what to tell the children," Liz continued. "Most of what you did at school is hard to explain by a natural way."

"Well, I only told them about our more harmless pranks, but you are right. We do have to be careful. They asked me already why I called you 'Lily' on the phone today," he informed her.

"They are quite bright and observant for their age; they do have some Marauder traits, haven't they?" she smiled proudly, then she stood up. "Let's go, say good night to them. It's already quite late."

On the other side of the door, Amy and Leo shared a startled look, before they turned around simultanously and darted along the corridor to their room. Leaving their door open in order to make no suspicious noises, they just managed to climb into their beds and grab a book each, before Liz and Jack entered the room.

Amy kept her face hidden behind the pages while Leo looked up, seemingly surprised when their parents entered the room.

"Oh, Mum, Dad, can I finish just this chapter before we turn off the light?"

Liz looked suspiciously at her son for a few seconds, but as he managed to keep the expression of an innocent question on his face, she just nodded. Then she sat down on his bed, tried to look on the cover of the book.

"What are you reading, Leo?" she asked curiously.

Leo turned the cover so that she could see it. "It's 'The Neverending Story,'" he replied enthusiastically. "Wouldn't it be cool, if you could just go into the world of a book, meet all your favourite characters and have adventures with them?"

Liz smiled at him, "Yes, I think that would really be fun," she agreed with her son. She stroked his hair and stood up to say good night to her daughter as well.

Amy put the book she had pretended to read down in her lap when she looked up. "Mum," she asked, while she threw a quick glance at Jack who was standing in the open door, leaning against the frame. "Does the broken friendship with the Marauders and the changing of your names have anything to do with each other?"

Liz looked at both of her children, who were looking at her with curiosity. Then she turned to Jack, asking him for help with her eyes, as she didn't exactly know what he had already told them today.

Jack sighed, stepped into the room and leaned backwards against the desk. "Yes, we changed our names, after our friend Peter betrayed us. But why we did it is a very complicated story."

"But when only Peter betrayed you, why don't you have contact to Sirius and Remus anymore?" asked Leo.

"As I said, it's a very complicated story. Fact is that we are too far away from our friends now to be together with them," Jack answered quietly, but his tone of voice suggested that the topic was closed for him.

Amy and Leo looked somewhat disappointed by this answer and turned to their mother in hope that she would give some more information. But she only shook her head and said quietly, "Believe us, we really do miss Sirius and Remus and if there was a way to get back together, we would do it. But right now it seems that we just have to accept that we will not see them anytime soon."

Jack, who still looked a bit lost in his own thoughts, kissed Amy and Leo good night and turned off the light in the children's bedroom.

As soon as the door was closed behind their parents, Amy hung her head out of her bed again to look at her brother.

"Well, what do you think?" she whispered

"About their conversation in the living room?"

"No, about the weather!" she said exasperatedly. "Of course I'm talking about their conversation in the living room."

"They are definitely hiding something from us," he stated the obvious. "I mean, they even said that they have to be more careful about what they are saying around us."

"Yes, and as we guessed, it has something to do with Mum being called 'Lily'. He even told her that we asked him about it! And she called Dad 'James' on one occasion, didn't she?" Amy remembered.

And now we know that they changed their names right after they had been betrayed. So there has to be something to it," Leo was convinced. "But what did she mean when she said that the pranks the Marauders did at school had no natural explanation?" he added.

"I have no idea," Amy admitted. "It does sound strange."

She closed her eyes for some moments to let the conversation she and her brother had witnessed pass her mind again.

"You know what," she said, when she opened them again. "We need to write down what we know already." She jumped down from her bed again and turned on the light. Then she went to the desk and got some paper and a pencil, before she sat on the bed of her brother.

"Okay...what do we have?" Amy muttered while she chewed on the end of the pencil.

"The different names, the betrayal, that Sirius and Remus are somewhere, that they can't be reached, that the Marauders played some pranks which can't be explained in a natural way, that Sirius had a dog called Padfoot, that the favourite victim of the Marauders was some slimy git called Severus Snape..."

"Stop, stop," said Amy, who had feverishly written down everything her brother had said. "Do you really think those last parts of information are important?"

Leo grinned. "Well, you never know, do you?"

Amy looked down at the paper. "Well, I guess we have quite a lot already. We only have to figure out what it all means."

Leo nodded, then he sat up straight and said in a dramatical voice,"To find out, why they have those names and why the pranks couldn't be explained in a natural way, that is going to be our first mission as the new Marauders!"

Amy grimaced. "Well, the mission sounds good, but we definitely need a name," she decided, while she folded the paper neatly and put it into Leo's book of "The Neverending Story" and turned off the light again, before returning to her own bed.

Leo nodded and for a few moments they were both silent to think about a name that would fit them.

"Twins...twins...it has to be something with twins," Leo muttered.

"Hmm, how about Twisters," Amy suggested.

"Twisters...," Leo savoured the sound of the name. Then he nodded his agreement. "Twisters sounds good."

"Great!" Amy exclaimed. Startled about her own loud voice she put her hand in front of her mouth.

"Great," she repeated a bit quiter, then she extended her hand down to Leo, who took it.

"The first mission of the Twisters will be to find out the secrets about Prongs, the Marauder, and his Marauder bride!"

A/N: Hi, sorry that I took a bit longer this time, but I was away during the Easter holidays.

In the next chapter the Twisters are successful in finding something about their parents secrets.

Thanks to Kabelkarsten and Jörg for beta-reading


	8. Padfoot

**Chapter 8 – Padfoot**

June 1996, the Ministry of Magic

"Come on, you can do better than that," Sirius was mocking his cousin Bellatrix Lestrange.

Fighting against a dozen deatheaters in the Department of Mysteries of the Ministry of Magic, helping to rescue his Godson from the minions of Lord Voldemort – actually _doing _something - Sirius felt more alive than he ever had for more than a decade.

The long years at Azkaban and the time locked up at Grimauld Place certainly hadn't done anything to improve his fitness, but standing in a fight against his evil cousin Bellatrix Lestrange, he felt the adrenaline rushing through his body. All those reflexes and instinctive reactions - he had trained when he was an Auror - were coming back to him, making him feel young again.

He knew that he was being reckless, playing with a dangerous enemy like that, but he couldn't do anything about it – too much did he enjoy the feeling of finally being free again. Grinning, he shot another hex at Bellatrix, which she dodged easily.

The beam of red light was flying toward him faster than he could react. With eyes widened by surprise, Sirius felt how the curse impacted in his chest. Everything slowed down for him, as his body arched backward and a dull pain spread in his chest from where the curse had made contact.

Knowing what was behind him, and that he could do nothing to regain his balance, Sirius let his gaze fly around the room for one last time. He saw that Harry was looking at him with a shocked expression on his face and locked his eyes on his Godson, trying to tell him with his eyes that he shouldn't worry about him and that he was sorry at the same time.

Then he felt a piece of fabric run gently over the top of his head and a moment later, the horrified face of his Godson had vanished from his view.

Sirius continued falling backwards. The initial shock that he had been cursed by his cousin was replaced by an agony in his chest, which was growing worse with each passing second, so that it was almost impossible for him to catch his breath.

And it was cold. So cold.

It required all of Sirius's strength to get some control over his body back, and while he was still falling – was this fall ever going to end? - he managed to curl into a fetal position. It still didn't help against this terrible cold. It seemed to come from his inside.

Having been influenced for twelve years by the cold and despair spread by the dementors of Azkaban, Sirius instinctly did the only thing that had helped him then – he transfigured into a big black dog.

Padfoot breathed a sigh of relief as the cold feeling decreased, but it immediately turned into a pained whine, as the transformation had only helped against the cold but not against the now unbearable pain in his chest.

The dog shook his head. He had to get out of here. He couldn't let this little scratch get to him. Harry was still involved in a fight on the other side of the veil, and as Sirius still felt quite alife, if really painful, he would fight to get back through this gateway to help his Godson. He would not abandon him.

He turned around to look in the direction where he had come from. And was surprised to see that the veil was only about two meters away from him and stayed at this distance. Wasn't he falling after all? He felt utterly weightless.

Encouraged by the closeness of his goal, Padfoot started to "swim" towards it, but in the same way he hadn't moved away from it earlier, he now didn't seem to get any closer.

_Come on,_ he thought. _It's just two meters – two steps, please, Harry, I'll be right back with you_. His paddling movements became more and more desperate and the pain in his chest flared fiercely.

Totally exhausted, he had to pause for a moment. His whole body was aching and he felt so weak. Longingly, he stared at the veil, which was so close, yet so far away.

And slowly – ever so slowly - it moved closer. Padfoot blinked. Was he imagining things? He pressed his eyes shut and opened them wide a moment later. Indeed, the veil was barely a meter away from him now.

With new determination, he concentrated hard and willed the veil to move even closer to him. Only twenty more centimeters. Tentatively, he reached out his left front paw. He could almost touch the old tattered fabric.

Suddenly he felt a violent pull coming from the veil and he was catapulted through it ruggedly.

He groaned painfully after he landed hard on his side. _I'm back!_ he suddenly realized. _I really did it! _His head snapped up to look for Harry.

But Harry wasn't there.

The Department of Mysteries wasn't there.

Padfoot had landed on the bottom of a staircase in an old house. To the left above him, there was a row of letterboxes and a few meters in front of him, there were high but narrow wooden double doors with dirty stained glass windows in the upper parts of the doors. One of the doors stood open and led out into a busy city street.

Padfoot scrambled on to his feet and fought against the dizziness threatening to overwhelm him. After his head had cleared somewhat, he stumbled on wobbly legs towards the doors. Those few steps had already totally exhausted him and he leaned heavily against the doorframe.

He was in London. He was sure of that. Something about this street seemed very familiar to him, but his thoughts were swirling around his head and he couldn't focus on it.

Padfoot looked around at the cars, which crowded the street and the hundreds of people rushing along. Most of them were dressed in summer clothes, as it was a very warm day.

It was daytime? How much time had he spent behind the veil? He and the other order members had rushed to the Ministry of Magic in the late evening.

Padfoot felt another wave of dizziness roll through him and his chest was hurting more than before. Whining slightly, he collapsed in the entrance of the house.

It was then that he heard his name.

"Look, doesn't he look a bit like Padfoot to you?"

Padfoot's head snapped up. In front of him stood a boy and a girl, who he was sure he had never seen before, but who nevertheless looked familiar.

"Be reasonable. How could he be. I'm sure he is just any black dog."

"But he reacted to the name. It must be him."

"If it really was him, he must be ancient, if he was the pet of Dad's best friend at school."

Padfoot shook his head at them and then let it fall heavily on his paws.

The last thing he heard before he lost consciousness, was the girl saying, "He understands us, but look, he's injured. We have to help him."

Jack was in a good mood. The weather was gorgeous and he had all the time in the world, as his first lesson was only at twelve o'clock. The children were on a three-day class trip to London and Liz was in London as well to write about the football European Cup, which was taking place in Britain this year.

Jack had awoken fairly early in the morning and had decided to take advantage of the nice weather and use the bike to go to school today.

As he rode along a path past small weekend houses and gardens and felt the fresh but warm air of an early summerday, he was sure that nothing could spoil his mood. He had worked at this school for around ten years now, why had he never before discovered how nice it was to take the bike instead of the car?

He turned around a corner and could already see the big red brick building. Some students were standing in front of the entrance, laughing and talking and clearly enjoying the sun.

Some of them greeted him as he rode past them, and he waved.

He leaned his bike to the wall of the gym, which was attached to the school building and walked up to the staff room, whistling a tune.

When he opened the door, Mrs. Fletcher, one of the English teachers, was rushing towards him.

"Mr. Pearson," she exclaimed, before he had even taken two steps into the room, "Mr. Carpenter has been trying to call you several times already. He left a number for you to call him back immediately once you are here."

Jack frowned. Jonathan Carpenter was the teacher accompanying the class trip, his children had gone on.

"Did he say why he was calling?" he asked Christine Fletcher.

She shook her head. "No, he didn't, but he seemed quite upset about something." She gave him a piece of paper. "That's the phone number of the youth hostel where you can reach him," she told him.

Jack felt as though an ice cube had settled in his stomach. Did something happen on the class trip? Were Amy and Leo alright?

With shaking hands, he took the receiver of the common phone in the staff room and dialled the number which was written on the paper in front of him.

"International Youth Hostel, London, good morning," a female voice greeted him from the other end of the line.

"Hello, this is Jack Pearson. I would like to talk to Jonathan Carpenter, please," Jack said and managed to keep his voice even.

"Yes, sir. One moment please," the woman informed him and put down the receiver, obviously to get Jonathan on the phone. Jack fought the urge to step from one foot to the other impatiently while he was waiting.

Finally he heard the noise of someone picking up the other receiver.

"Is this you, Jack?" he heard the agitated voice of his colleague and friend.

"Yes, what's wrong, Jon?" _Please don't let it have anything to do with the twins_, he thought.

"Jack listen, I'm really sorry, but when we went to the British Museum this morning, and when we got there we counted –"

Jack couldn't take this. "Jon, tell me what happened!" he yelled into the phone.

There was a heavy silence. "Leo and Amy are missing, Jack," came the soft and defeated answer. "We noticed two hours ago. We already informed the police. They're looking for them. I'm sure, they will find them, Jack."

Jack fell into the next chair. _Why? Why were they missing? Would they just run off by themselves? But two hours! They would be back by this time! Amy and Leo were responsible kids, they wouldn't do something like that. But what if they hadn't left the group on purpose...what if they got lost...what if they were kidnapped...what if...they..._

"Jack!" Jonathan interrupted Jack's thoughts, which were growing darker and darker.

"Jack, I also called Liz half an hour ago. She's on her way here. As soon as we have any news, I'm going to call you again, okay? I'm sorry, Jack."

Jack nodded glumly, but then remembered that Jonathan couldn't see him, so he murmured "Okay," into the receiver.

Suddenly, something snapped in Jack's mind. "Wait," he shouted. "I'm coming to London. I'll be there as soon as I can. I'll come to the youth hostel, alright," he told his friend frantically.

"Jack, please calm down—"

"NO!" Jack interrupted him. "I'm leaving right now. See you in a couple of hours." He slammed the receiver down, stood up and rushed from the staff room, ignoring the curious glances from his colleagues.

As he rode back on his bike to his house, he hated himself for using the bike today of all days. Why couldn't he have taken the car? He would already be on the road to London.

Finally, totally sweaty and thirsty, he reached the house. He just grabbed the car keys and a bottle of water before he jumped into his car and started racing to London.

Considering his reckless driving, Jack was really lucky that he got to London without trouble.

A police car was standing in front of the youth hostel and Jack parked his car behind it. He hastily climbed out of the car and was about to enter the building, when he heard someone calling him.

"Dad, wait!"

Jack whirled around and saw Leo running towards him.

Feeling like a huge weight was lifted from his shoulders, he laughed aloud and embraced his son in a bear hug.

After the initial feeling of relief had passed, he released him and looked around.

"Where is your sister, Leo?" he asked anxious.

"She stayed with the dog. He is injured and we have to help him!" he answered, speaking very fast.

Jack stared at his son, "What?"

"Amy and I found this big black dog. It looked the way you had described Padfoot and it was injured --," Leo started to explain.

Jack, whose nerves were extremely tense already, lost it. "I WAS WORRIED SICK ABOUT YOU, AND YOU JUST RAN AWAY FROM THE GROUP FOR SOME STUPID DOG!"

"Jack, I thought, I heard you shouting outside," Liz was coming out of the building, Jonathan right behind her.

"Leo, were have you been? What happened? Where is Amy?" she asked, while she flung herself on her son. Leo hugged her back while he glanced uncertainly around her at his father. Never before had he heard him yelling at him like this.

Leo entangled himself from his mother's embrace.

"Mum, Dad, I have written down the street, where Amy and I found Padfoot and where she is waiting with him. Lets go there now and I explain everything in the car," he said far to seriously for a twelve-year old, and gave them a crumpled piece of paper, which was damp from sweat, with the name of a street on it.

Jack and Liz shared a glance, then nodded. They knew where this street was. Jonathan looked at each of them, then nodded as well and went back inside to take care of the rest of the class and inform the police officers that they had found at least the missing boy.

Once all three of them were sitting in the car, Leo's parents were looking at him expectantly to start explaining.

Leo cleared his throat, a bit nervous, and began.

"You know, last year, when you told Amy and me about the Marauders, we had a feeling that you didn't tell us everything. So Amy and I decided, that we wanted to be exactly like the Marauders, and that they – I mean you – oh, you know what I mean –" he ruffled his hair in a gesture which he had obviously copied from his father.

"Anyway, we thought that the marauders wouldn't leave a mystery like this unsolved, would they? So we started investigating what you were not telling us, just for fun. We didn't find out much, until two weeks ago, when we found this London map in which you marked some places red."

Jack and Liz glanced at each other. They had marked all the wizarding places of their own world in the map.

"We thought the class trip would be the perfect opportunity to check out some of these places," Leo continued, "and today we were quite close to that point which was marked on the map with M.o.M., so we left the group to look what that was. Honestly, we just wanted to take a look and then get back. But then we saw this big black dog in the entrance of one of the buildings around the place, and when Amy told me it looked a bit like Padfoot, it suddenly looked up, as if that was really its name.

"Anyway, the dog seemed badly injured and passed out, while we were still deciding what to do with it, so Amy stayed with it and I came back to the youth hostel. I'm really glad, that you were already there..." Leo ended his story.

Jack and Liz looked at each other and there was a hint of fear in their eyes. Leo and Amy had found this dog at the place, where there was the Ministry of Magic in their own world, and it had reacted to the name Padfoot. That were too many coincidences. What if it was really true, and Sirius had come to their world? Sirius had died.

They finally reached the square where Leo had left Amy and Padfoot. Jack parked the car on the pavement. He didn't care about recieving a parking ticket.

Leo and his parents climbed out of the car and walked over to the building where Leo and Amy had first found the big black dog.

Leo opened the right of the double doors as he showed his parents the way - and stopped abruptly, as he saw the hallway deserted. "They are gone," he exclaimed worriedly. "Where are they?" he said more quietly and his voice was trembling slightly.

"I'm sure, they can't be far away," Liz tried to calm her son down, but sounded far less confident than she would have liked to. She glanced at Jack, who was looking around in the empty hallway, as if trying to find a niche where his daughter could be hidden. Then he turned around to his wife, the fear on his face barely concealed.

But before he could say anything, they heard steps coming down from the stairs of the old house and only moments later, Amy came into view.

"Amy, where have you been?" Leo cried out in relief. "Where is the dog?"

Before she had the chance to answer, she was already hugged fiercely by both of her parents. "Amy, we were so worried about you," said Liz with a choked voice as she held her daughter tight.

After allowing her parents to hold her for a few more moments, she struggled free. "Mum, Dad, has Leo told you about the dog already? We think it's Padfoot. He reacted to the name," the words jumbled out of her mouth excitedly.

"Where is it now, and where were you?" Leo interrupted his sister.

"When I was sitting here, with Padfoot on my lap, this old woman who lives here walked past me and asked me, what was wrong with the dog. Then she called the vet and we brought Padfoot into her flat. Mrs.Winter bandaged his wounds – he had a really nasty burn on his chest – and put him into warm blankets. Now the vet must be here any minute," she explained.

Jack took a deep breath. Both of his children were so excited. Didn't they understand, what he had been going through today, because he was so afraid that something had happened to them. Liz interrupted his thoughts. "Why don't we go up and meet this Mrs. Winter and Padfoot?" she suggested.

Everyone agreed and so they climbed the stairs to the second story of the building, where the door to Mrs. Winter's flat stood a crack wide open. Amy knocked on the door and called out, "Mrs. Winter, my parents and my brother are here now."

"Please come in," a warm, alto voice invited them in the flat. Mrs. Winter was just coming out of a room at the end of the corridor of her flat. She was a tall but sturdy woman in her mid-fifties. Her dark brown hair was streaked with grey and her brown eyes twinkled, as she greeted Jack, Liz and Leo. "So you are the parents and the brother of this great young lady. Please, come in. The dog is in the living room, we are just waiting for the vet."

Amy was walking quickly into the living room and impatiently pulled her mother with her. Then she let go her mother's sleave and knelt down next to the dog. It seemed to be sleeping peacefully under a red and blue blanket. She gently stroked his shaggy head.

Liz looked down at the dog. He certainly looked a lot like the transformed Sirius, but as far as she could see, he was much thinner and his fur was quite mangy.

She knelt down next to her daughter and gently patted the dog's head as well. Then she looked up at Jack, who had now also come into the living room. He had an expression of disbelieving shock on his face.

"Lily," he whispered hoarsely, "It really is him."

A/N: Sorry for the cliffy. For now that is all that I have prewritten, so now it will take little longer for me to update, probably once a month or so. I hope you will still stay with the story. It's worth it: Chapter 9 - "Leo in trouble" - tells about the consequences of Leo and Amy running away from the class.

I want to thank my wonderful betas Kabelkarsten and Jörg


	9. Leo in Trouble

**Chapter 9 – Leo in trouble**

Jack did not know how long he had been standing there, staring at the big unconscious black dog. After what seemed like an eternity, he mechanically crouched down next to the animal and slowly reached out a shaking hand to touch the shaggy head.

Finally, he drew his eyes away from Padfoot reluctantly and looked up to Mrs. Winter.

"Thank you for taking care of him," he croaked.

"This dog means a lot to you," she observed and nodded understandingly. "He will be fine," she assured him.

For some moments nobody said anything. Jack, Liz and Amy were still kneeling around Padfoot, while Leo had taken a seat on the edge of an arm chair right next to his family.

The ringing of the door bell sounded unnaturally loud in the silence and Mrs. Winter went to open the door for the vet.

The doctor wasted no time getting to his patient and only nodded briefly grunting his name, Dr. Abner, as Liz, Jack and Amy quickly stood up to let him through to Padfoot.

While he carefully pulled off the bandages, he asked Jack, "Are you the owner of the dog?"

Jack nodded absently and watched the vet do his work. When he saw the chest of his best friend's animal form, he sharply sucked air in. An area as large as his fist was totally charred. It was surrounded by a circle of ugly yellowish brown blisters, which went over into angrily red inflamed skin, still partly covered with patches of singed black fur.

"A _Volcanis_ Curse," he muttered horrified. "Padfoot, who did this to you?" He had learned of this curse when he had once done a project on timed curses in his NEWT Defence against the Dark Arts. When it hit the victim, it only felt like a forcefull blow, but after a few minutes the touched skin would grow hotter and hotter and burn, finally spreading so far that it effected the whole body.

He barely noticed Liz touching his shoulder. "James, don't worry, it will not spread further, not _here_," she whispered. She, too, had recognized the curse.

The vet had obviously heard them, as he sharply turned his head. "Do you know anything about this injury?" he asked sternly. "Because I have never seen anything like that."

"No, I don't know," Jack answered. "We have found him like that." How could he inform the vet that he was dealing with a magical wound?

Dr. Abner nodded, obviously doubting the honesty of Jack's answer and returned to his work of disinfecting the wound and applying some kind of ointment on it before covering it with bandages again.

When he was done, he stood up and faced Jack. "That's all I can do for him right now. He will recover, but it will take time. You don't live in London, do you?"

Jack shook his head.

"Well then, Mr. ... er..."

"Pearson," said Jack.

"Well then, Mr. Pearson. It is safe for you to take the dog home with you now. I gave him something for the pain. I suggest you consult your local veterinarian as soon as you get home," the doctor said while he still eyed Jack and Liz suspiciously.

Jack nodded and turned to Mrs. Winter. "Mrs. Winter, I want to thank you for helping Padfoot. Could you please keep an eye on him for another hour, so that we could bring the children back to the youth hostel?"

"Of course, Mr. Pearson," she answered warmly. "If you still have things to do in London, it is much better for the dog to stay here than in a car."

"I'll take the children back to the youth hostel now. Why don't you do all the paper work with Dr. Abner now? Do you have enough money?"

Jack checked his wallet and nodded again. Mrs. Winter led him and the vet in her large kitchen while Liz and the children said good bye and left the flat.

"Mum, do we have to stay in London until tomorrow?" asked Amy when she, her mother and her brother were in the car on their way back to the youth hostel.

Liz glanced at her daughter through the back mirror. "Yes, we would rather go home with Dad and Padfoot," Leo piped up from the front seat next to his mother.

Liz drove on silently for some time, while she was thinking about the request of her children. "Hm," she said slowly after a while, "I will talk to Mr. Carpenter about it. As I see it, he is going to punish you for running away. I may suggest him that he sends you home with Dad."

Leo and Amy shared a look. Until now they had not thought about the consequences of their actions. They were quite lucky that their little trip had such a positive result for their parents so that they were hoping to receive no punishment from their side. But their class mates would surely not be happy with them for spoiling half a day of the trip. Taking that into account, additionally to being worried what happened to Padfoot now, going home with Jack would be no punishment at all.

Leo nodded enthusiastically. "Yes, that's a really good idea Mum. And you know," he added after some thought. "We could help to take care of Padfoot tomorrow when Dad has to go to school and you stay here in London for the European Cup. I mean, we can't leave the poor, injured dog home alone, can we?"

Amy smiled at her brother. She had a feeling that their Mum would do everything now to convince Mr. Carpenter to send them home early.

Only a few minutes later, they arrived at the youth hostel. The police car was still standing in front of it and Liz had a feeling that they would spend more than a few minutes here. The officer must be quite irritated that they hadn't informed him where they were going to pick up Amy.

Liz sighed and walked up the stairs to the grey three-storey building, her children following her.

"Okay, you go and get your stuff, while I talk to Mr. Carpenter, alright?" she told them.

Leo and Amy nodded and darted up the stairs to their rooms. The girls' rooms were on the second floor and the boys' rooms on the third floor. So they parted and Leo went up the final staircase alone.

He didn't meet any of his class mates. Surely they were downstairs in the TV-room, watching TV or playing card games. Some might also be in the sports room, where there was a ping pong table and a dart board. Leo was grateful that he didn't meet anyone and hoped his room would be empty as well.

Leo let out a sigh of relief as he opened the door to the room he shared with three of his classmates and found it empty. It was however not empty of clothes, which lay scattered on the floor mixed with several bags of crisps and half-empty cola bottles. One or two colourful football magazines could be seen among this chaos.

Leo collapsed on his bed and took in the mess around him. It would take some time to sort everything out that belonged to him and get it packed. Listlessly, he started to shove around some clothes with his foot while still sitting on the bed. After some moments, though, he remembered why he was here and with a great sigh, he got up from the bed and started to fish his own belongings out of the chaotic piles. He stuffed everything in his back pack unorderly and ten minutes later, he forced the zipper shut, hoping that he had everything in there.

It was when he took a final look around in the room that the door opened and Kyle Banister, one of his room mates, stepped inside.

"Wow, you're back?" he sneered.

Leo looked up, surprised. Kyle wasn't exactly his friend, but they got along well enough and Leo knew that Kyle was only being sarcastic when he was really upset about something.

"Er, sorry?" Leo answered, unsure what Kyle expected from him.

"Oh, shut up, Pearson! You know how boring it was to sit around in this stupid house all day long, when you and your stupid sister had fun exploring London on your own?" he asked, getting louder and angrier with every single word.

"We had a good reason to run off. It was really important!" Leo snapped defiantly. He could understand that Kyle was angry, but he was clearly overreacting.

"Oh yeah?" he drawled. "And what was so damn important?"

"I can't tell you," Leo huffed. "But if it makes you feel better, Amy and I are sent home. That's why I was packing." He shouldered his back pack and walked towards the door.

Kyle was faster than him and stood in his way.

"You arrogant prat," he hissed, his eyes blazing angrily. "Only because your parents can afford such a trip easily and don't mind if you mess it up doesn't mean that everyone else's parents can, too!"

Leo was taken aback. He remembered that Kyle's father was unemployed and how much Kyle had been looking forward to this trip. He suddenly did feel a bit guilty about the whole thing - no he didn't! He and Amy had saved Padfoot. There was nothing to feel sorry for.

"Yeah, great, Banister," Leo exclaimed. "And what do you think I am supposed to do now?" he asked, his voice dripping of irony.

"Just go home and get lost, Pearson!" Kyle barged roughly into his shoulder, as he passed him and stepped right onto one of the football magazines. The glossy pages slid against each other and Kyle lost his balance. As he fell backwards, he waved his arms frantically and managed to grab a handfull of Leo's shirt, pulling him down to his knees in the process.

Leo spun around his head and upper body. "Kyle, are you alright?" he asked, startled.

Kyle nodded weakly from the ground. Then he sat up and turned around, groaning a little.

"Pearson!" a voice shouted from the door. "Get off him right now!"

Leo turned around and saw Toni Merricks and Brian Russell, Kyles two best friends, standing in the door, glaring at him.

"I didn't do –" Leo began, but was interrupted by Kyle.

"He attacked me from behind, that bloody coward," Kyle whined.

"What?" His head flew around to the boy on the floor. Kyle was shooting him a spiteful glare.

Before he could get over his shock about Kyle's behaviour, he felt himself lifted up roughly by a pair of strong hands on the back of his neck. Leo turned around and faced a very angry Toni Merricks

"Toni, really, I didn't –" he stuttered.

"Is the great and strong Leo Pearson afraid of two 'losers'?" Toni taunted him, while he held him tight by the scruff of his neck.

"Of course, I'm not afraid of someone like you, Merricks," Leo replied. "I'm just surprised about your friend down there on the floor, telling lies in such a shameless manner," he added, disgruntled.

"Shut up," Toni yelled and shoved him backwards violently. Leo stumbled over Kyle's foot and lost his balance. He landed hard on his side and felt a fierce pain shooting through his right shoulder, which intensified a hundredfold, when Toni fell on him only a moment later.

"AAHH! Damn it!" he screamed. "Get off me, you blockheaded son-of...!

"Leonard Pearson, watch your language," they heard a stern woman's voice saying. "Toni Merricks, get off him this instance," added a not less stern man's voice.

Toni jumped up while Leo scrambled to his feet, holding his shoulder. The four boys now stood in the room, looking at Mr. Carpenter, Liz Pearson and Amy, who were standing in the door.

Liz glared at the other three, before she focussed on her son. "Are you ready to leave, then?" she asked in a forced neutral tone.

Leo nodded and took his backpack over his left uninjured shoulder, sucking in air as the movement caused him pain.

Liz stepped into the room, took the backpack from him and eyed him critically. "Leo, are you alright?" she asked, concern showing in her eyes.

Leo just pressed his lips together tightly and nodded. He left the room with a final glare at Kyle.

Mr. Carpenter shook Liz's hand and nodded at Amy and Leo. "Goodbye. I see you at school on Monday," he said with a serious and disappointed expression on his face.

"Bye, sir," the twins murmured as they followed their mother outside.

The last thing Leo heard, before they walked down the stairs, was Mr. Carpenter saying, "And now to you, boys..."

Once they sat in the car, Leo had problems fastening his seatbelt because his shoulder was hurting so much.

"What exactly happened?" Liz asked concernedly.

"I fell on it, and Merricks fell on it too." Leo was angry and embarrassed that Toni had gotten the better of him. _In a fair fight, that little coward wouldn't have had a chance against me_, Leo thought indignantly.

"Let me have a look at it," Liz demanded. Then she carefully opened the buttons of his shirt and slid it off his right shoulder. A large bruise was beginning to form there and the whole area between his neck and the end of his shoulder was swollen.

Liz put the shirt back in place and sighed. "We better show your shoulder to the doctor."

"Mum, really, I'm okay," Leo huffed, now obviously in a very bad mood. But if he couldn't show how strong he was in the fight, he would at least show that he was strong enough to deal with a little bit of pain now.

Liz rolled her eyes, but didn't comment on this. Instead, she just started the car to drive back to the building, which would be the Ministry of Magic in her own world.

When she arrived, she parked the car next to the phone box again.

"Amy, you go upstairs and tell your father that we are back while I try to call Dr. Clifford."

Dr. Clifford was their family doctor and Liz thought it best to try to get an appointment there now. He had an x-ray machine in his practise, and if she would try to find a doctor, she didn't even know one here in London, they probably wouldn't be much earlier than driving the two hours back home.

Liz was lucky and got an appointment for Leo later this afternoon. She exited the phone box and went into the building where she already heard Jack and Amy coming downstairs.

Jack was carrying Padfoot in his arms, who was wrapped in a blue woolly blanket. The dog seemed to be quite heavy, even though it was unnaturally thin, as Jack was swaying slightly under the weight.

They all went outside and Jack put Padfoot gently into the backseat of the car, next to Leo.

"We should paint our little ambulance white and put a red cross on it, shouldn't we?" Amy chuckled. Leo threw her a venomous glare.

Jack and Liz were kissing softly and saying goodbye outside of the car. "Are you sure, we shouldn't take you back to the youth hostel to get your car?" Jack asked her softly.

"Yes, Jack. Just go home and bring Padfoot and Leo to their doctors. I can take the tube, it's no problem."

Jack looked into her green eyes for a moment. Then he nodded. "Okay, Lily," he whispered. "See you next week, then. I'll call you when we are home."

They kissed lightly one last time and then Jack got into the car and they went home to Dawlish.

"What were you actually fighting about?" Jack asked, as he, Amy and Leo sat in the waiting room of Dr. Clifford's surgery. Padfoot was lying on a blanket behind the reception desk. There were not so many patients this late in the afternoon and the reception nurse had a weakness for dogs and had taken pity on him.

"It was really stupid," Leo answered. "Banister and I had an argument about me and Amy running off today. He said something about his parents having had trouble to afford the trip, and me messing it up now. Then he slipped on some magazine and pulled me down with him. Few moments after that, Merricks and Russell came into the room and Banister told them to rough me up, because I had supposedly attacked him from behind. I was so surprised by this that I didn't even react when Merricks attacked me," he explained monotonously.

When Jack looked at his son, his eyes were full of sadness. "It hurts when one of your mates stabs you in the back, doesn't it?" he said more to himself than to his son.

However, some seconds later he had caught himself and said sternly, "In one point, Banister was right, though. Through your behaviour you messed up the trip not only for him, but also for all of your other class mates and Jonathan. You had your mother and me terribly worried and you had two police officers looking for you."

"But Dad -- ," Amy interrupted.

"Please, Amy, let me finish," Jack said calmly. "Your Mum and I are eternally grateful that your little adventure today ended so fortunate and you found Padfoot. But I must ask you to think about the consequences of your behaviour before you act. The least you could have done today was to inform someone about what you were doing. There are enough phone boxes in London, and as far as I remember, there was one right in front of the building where you found Padfoot.

Amy and Leo hung their heads and murmured something incoherent.

Then Leo looked up curiously, slightly whincing as the movement effected his injured shoulder.

"Dad, what did 'MoM' on your London map mean? What was so special about that building, and why did we find the dog of your long lost friend there of all places?"

Jack sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "I'm really sorry, I can't tell you."

"Dad!" Amy protested. "You know, what happened today was because Leo and I didn't have a clue about anything, but we are nonetheless very curious about what's going on in our own family. And if you don't tell us, we will continue to put our noses in things, and maybe end up doing stupid things, just because we didn't know any better." She looked smugly at her father.

Jack groaned, while Leo grinned proudly at his sister and gave her a thumbs-up.

"Your Mum is going to kill me when I tell you, and you are not going to believe me anyway."

The twins looked at him defiantly. "Well, try us!" Leo challenged him

"I'm going to regret this," he murmured under his breath. Loudly he said, "It's a very long story. I'll tell you when we get home, alright?"

A/N: So, this was the 9th chapter. Stay tuned for chapter 10 "The new Pet", in which you will read, how Padfoot deals with his new surroundings and the fact that he might never be human again.


	10. The new Pet

**Chapter 10 – The new Pet**

It was already after nine when Jack, Amy and Leo walked out of Dr. Clifford's surgery, Leo sporting a huge cast around the right part of his upper body, allowing his broken collarbone to mend, and Jack carrying Padfoot on his arms.

Dr. Clifford had agreed to take a look at him, mainly because his son was one of Jack's students and the two men knew each other quite well and because this late at night it would be hard to find a vet to look at Padfoot, although Jack owed him a couple of drinks now. While Dr. Clifford had been examining him, Padfoot had woken up again, but was too weak to realize what was happening around him. Still Dr. Clifford was optimistic, because Padfoot wasn't unconscious anymore, but merely sleeping and he was sure that the dog should be as good as new by the end of the summer.

The long day taking toll on the twins, both of them fell asleep on the short car trip from Dr. Clifford's surgery to their home. Bringing the twins to bed was a quick and easy task for Jack as they were so tired.

After he had closed the door to the twins' room behind him, he took a beer out of the fridge and collapsed on the sofa, next to Padfoot, who was already sleeping on the rug in front of the sofa. After leaning his head on the back rest and closing his eyes for some moments, Jack took a deep breath and reached for the telephone. He had promised Liz to call her when he had arrived at home.

"Liz Pearson," his wife answered the phone.

"Hi Liz, it's me. We're back home now," he said tiredly.

"Good. Are the children already in bed?" Liz didn't sound any less tired.

"Yes, they fell asleep in the car and went to bed immediately after we got home. Leo's collarbone is broken. He has to wear the cast for three weeks and he has to be careful with his shoulder some weeks after that as well."

Liz sighed. "He will not like that. Especially in the summer holidays."

"Padfoot will keep him good company. He doesn't like sitting around, either," Jack said, smiling. "Dr. Clifford said that he should rest a lot, but that he should be alright by the end of the summer," he added and looked fondly at the dog-form of his best friend.

The dog opened one eye with some effort and blinked back at him. "He just woke up again," Jack informed Liz about Padfoot and sat closer to the dog to pat him behind the ears.

"Okay, take care of him," said Liz. "We can talk again when you come back from school tomorrow."

"Good night. I love you." Jack put the receiver down and turned to his best friend.

"Hi mate, how are you?" Jack whispered. The dog looked up at him with an expression, Jack was sure that if the dog could talk, he would proclaim him crazy to ask such a question,.

Jack sighed and stood up. "I'll get you some water," he told him and made his way into the kitchen.

Gratefully, the dog started to drink the water noisefully. Jack watched him, smiling sadly. "Really, Padfoot, I don't know if I should be happy or worried about you being here."

But the dog, still exhausted from his injury, had already fallen asleep again.

When Jack finally went to bed, he left the door to his room open so that he could hear when Padfoot needed him.

Leo awoke to the grey light before dawn. He had not slept well, waking up every hour or so. His broken collar bone was only throbbing a little but he suspected that his subconscious concern to turn on the injured shoulder had kept him awake.

Yawning, he climbed out of bed and silently cursed the fact that he couldn't take a shower with the cast. He trudged into the kitchen to get himself some milk. When he went back into the sitting room, he was startled to see a huge mass of black fur lying in front of the sofa. After a moment of surprise, though, the events of the past day came back to him and he joined Padfoot on the floor.

"Hello Padfoot," Leo greeted the dog, yawning again."You know, my father is really happy that you are here. I think he misses his friends from school quite a lot. But you, being Sirius's pet must remind him of his old schooldays. And maybe, when you are fine again, you could even show him where Sirius is. That would really make him happy," Leo told the sleeping dog.

Leo's eyes stung from the lack of sleep and he half lay down with his upper body on the sofa, his left elbow supporting his weight, his feet still resting on the ground, only closing his eyes for a few moments.

When he opened them again, the sun was shining brightly into the sitting room and the noise of the shower running came from the bath room. Leo sat up and shook his left arm which felt numb where he had lain on it.

Padfoot looked at him curiously. He still looked weak and in pain, but his eyes were watching him clearly and alert.

"Good morning," Leo muttered at the dog. "I guess, you wonder where you are and who I am," he told the dog, only to say something. The intelligent gaze of the dog was somewhat unnerving.

Leo hadn't really expected any reaction to this remark. So he was quite astonished to see the dog nod at his question.

"Er, ... yes, er, my name is Leo. Leo Pearson," he stuttered. My sister Amy and I found you yesterday in London. Now you are at our place in Dawlish. My Dad was the best friend of your owner, Sirius Black, when they were still in school, so you probably know him, but he hasn't seen him in many, many years. I've never met him, which is actually too bad. I'm sure he could teach me and my sister a lot, as he was one of the great marauders. Sure, my Dad was a marauder as well, but he is 'to involved in our up-bringing to put too much nonsense into our minds...'" When Leo had gotten over his first qualms about talking to a dog, the words all but poured out of him.

Sirius listened to the boy in amazement. He claimed to be a son of a marauder, but how could that be possible? He was sure that he had seen James the other day. Or had that been a hallucination, induced by the horrible pain of his burn? _Now, let me think a moment here._ Sirius closed his eyes. _I fell through the veil. So I should be dead. James is dead. So I met him in afterlife. That makes sense. But I don't feel dead at all. And how the hell was it possible for James to have children, after he had died? And why is the name of his son 'Pearson' and not 'Potter'?_

Sirius snapped out of his thoughts as he saw Leo looking at him as if he waited for some answer. Not having paid any more attention to what Leo was saying, Sirius tilted his head to ask the boy to repeat his question.

"I said, you must be hungry," Leo said patiently. "Would you like something to eat or to drink?"

The thought of food made Sirius's stomach growl loudly. Leo laughed at him and got up to search the refridgerator for anything suitable for a dog's stomach.

He came back with the rests of some Chinese take-away food, a package of bacon and a tin of tuna in one hand and carefully balancing a bowl of water in the right hand, which proved a bit difficult because of the cast.

"I never had a dog before, so I have absolutely no idea what you like," he said apologetically as he was piling the food on the floor in front of the sofa.

With great appetite Padfoot ate all of the bacon and most of the Chinese food. He didn't touch the tuna at all. Leo also had to refill his bowl of water two more times.

"Good morning," said Jack cheerfully, as he walked into the sitting room. His raven hair was still damp from the shower and stood wildly into every direction. "You two are up early. And as I see, Padfoot is already enjoying his breakfast."

Sirius looked up, as he heard the voice of his best friend. Even though he knew that he was now in the home of James and his family it was still hard for him to believe. James looked good in his opinion. His hair was still as black and unruly as he had known it. He still wore glasses, although they were not round anymore but rectangular. He had a slight tan and there were small wrinkles around his mouth and eyes. James Potter looked like a happy and healthy man in his best age.

It was unbelievable to Sirius. How could someone age after they had died? How could he, Sirius, still feel pain after he had died? Sirius put all of his weight on his front paws and tried to get up. He stood for a moment on shaking legs before he fell sideways, leaning against the seat of the sofa.

Jack rushed forward and gently pushed him down on the carpet again. "Easy there, mate. You have a nasty burn. You should be careful and not overexert yourself."

Sirius snorted, but stayed on the ground. He had so many questions, but how could he ask them. He cast a short glance at Leo but than shrugged. Sooner or later, the boy would learn that he was not a normal dog. Sirius screwed up his face and tried to transform. He could feel his human side was there somewhere, but he couldn't reach it. He concentrated hard. Something was extremely wrong. Usually it should be hard to keep the Animagus form when one was injured. But now it was almost impossible to transform back. What if it was impossible? Sirius felt ice cold panic rush through him. Through a haze he heard how James told Leo to go and prepare breakfast for the two of them.

Then his best friend crouched down towards him, patted his shoulder and called his name.

"Sirius, please Sirius, listen to me," he said insistently.

Sirius forced his thoughts away from the transfiguration process and looked at his friend to show that he was listening.

"Sirius, please don't try to transform; I don't think it's good for you now." The dog tilted his head. "You were hit with a Volcanis Curse and are still very weak. I don't know, all the effects of the curse, but it is better not to risk anything."

Seeing the thoughtful and slightly suspicious expression on the dog's face, Jack felt a bit guilty about lying to his friend, but how could he tell him, that he might never be able to transform back to a man, right before going to work and then leaving Padfoot to ponder on his fate all alone the whole day long.

The sound of Leo working in the kitchen to prepare breakfast interrupted Jack's thoughts. A glance into the face of Padfoot told him that his friend had about a thousand thoughts swirling around in his mind and at least as many questions.

"Padfoot, we don't have much time to talk now, because I have to go to work soon. Leo and my daughter Amy will stay here with you. They also have my phone number from work, in case you need me. When I'm back home in the afternoon, I will try to tell you everything you want to know."

Sirius doubted that James could answer all his questions when Sirius couldn't ask them, but for now he just nodded.

Jack sighed as Leo was joining him on the floor next to Padfoot. "I'm finished," Leo told his dad. "Now we only have to wait until the coffee is ready."

Although he realized, how lucky he was to be found and taken in by James's family of all people, Sirius suddenly felt weary and tired now. The pain in his chest was throbbing constantly and he felt that James was not telling him something important. At the moment he just wanted to close his eyes and forget everything around him.

He noticed that James was telling him something and grunted uncommitedly in reply, before his eyelids became more and more heavy and sleep took him.

"Padfoot still needs to rest a lot. I think he doesn't feel like getting up either, so there should be no problems. But in case you need me, you have my phone number, right," Jack asked Leo as they sat down for breakfast.

Leo nodded. They ate in silence for a moment, before Leo asked, "Dad, how old is Padfoot actually?"

Jack swallowed some of his coffee and looked at his watch. "Oh, so late already. I really need to run," he ignored the question of his son.

"Take care of Padfoot and of course yourself and that shoulder of yours too," he said, while standing up and going into the hallway to put on his shoes. "I will be back around three."

He waved good bye and closed the front door behind him.

Leo shook his head and started to put the dirty dishes away. He left the food on the table for Amy, when she would get up. _Something must be special about Padfoot_, he thought.

Wanting to wake neither his sister nor Padfoot, Leo searched the book case in the sitting room for something interesting. Soon he was sitting on the sofa and reading "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer."

It was almost noon before Amy appeared in the sitting room, still looking a bit sleepy.

"Morning," she mumbled as she made her way to the breakfast table.

Leo put his book down. "Morning?" he asked. "I had breakfast more than four hours ago. I would think it is rather time for lunch."

Amy was startled and looked at her watch. "Wow!" she exclaimed. "It's really strange, if you don't have to go to school and no one wakes you up! I guess I can skip breakfast then. Let's make some lunch."

The twins went into the kitchen to investigate what was there. It didn't take long for them to agree to make spaghetti, which would surely be easy.

Amy filled a large pot with water, put some salt in there and now they only had to wait for the water to boil, before they could put the spaghetti in. Meanwhile, they could prepare the sauce.

"Have you ever watched Mum preparing spaghetti sauce?" asked Leo.

"No, but it can't be that difficult. I think you only need to warm up some ketchup. It tastes almost the same, don't you think."

They put another, smaller pot on the stove and emptied a whole bottle of ketchup in it. After some minutes, large bubbles began to build on the surface of the thick red mass. Eyery time one of them burst, ketchup flew out of the pot and decorated the stove, the kitchen wall and the shirts of the two little cooks.

"Quickly, we have to stir it!" Leo told Amy and handed her a spoon. Amy put the spoon into the pot with the intention to do as Leo had said, but just that moment, another bubble burst and sprayed her hand with hot ketchup.

"Ouch! That was hot!" she yelled and let the spoon go, which instantly sank into the sticky mass.

While Amy waved her hand around wildly, Leo pulled the pot sideways from the heat, telling his sister frantically to put the hand under water.

When the bubbling hot ketchup had calmed down, Leo got another spoon and tried to stir it, scraping some hard and burnt ketchup at the bottom of the pot. "Well, it is really thick, not like sauce at all," he observed.

"Maybe we should add some water," his sister suggested.

"Good idea," he agreed and poured two cups of water into the pot, which now was full up to the rim. Carefully, he mixed the ketchup with the water. But somehow it still didn't look right to him. _Maybe it was too much water_, he wondered.

Amy took the spoon out of his hand and tried their creation. "It tastes like nothing," she stated expertly. "It definitely needs salt and pepper."

After adding the spices to the sauce, the next big adventure the twins had to face was pouring the spaghetti water away, but keeping the spaghetti. Leo held a sieve with his left hand over the kitchen sink, while Amy poured all the spaghetti into it. The two of them looked extremely awkward, but managed to decant the water just fine.

Breathing a deep sigh of relief, the twins set the table. Leo walked over to the sofa to wake up Padfoot. He patted him slightly on the head and said softly, "Hey Padfoot, we've made some lunch. Are you hungry?"

The dog opened his eyes and sniffed the air, which smelled somewhat sourly. He nodded at Leo, but still was suspicious of the smell.

Amy thoughtfully spread some newspaper in front of Padfoot, before Leo filled a large bowl of spaghetti and sauce for him. "I hope you like it," he told the dog. "We made it on our own," he added proudly.

They sat down at the table and filled their own plates. It tasted totally different from when their mother cooked for them. The spaghetti were still a bit too hard and the sauce tasted like red, salty water with a hint of burned ketchup, but for Leo and Amy, it tasted just great. It was the first meal they had ever cooked by themselves. And Padfoot seemed to like it well enough. He even ate more than half of the portion Leo had served him.

When their plates were empty, they put them back into the kitchen, which looked as if a battle had taken place there. Amy and Leo looked at each other. "Let's clean up later," Amy groaned. "Of course, how else will Dad ever believe that we cooked by ourselves?" Leo grinned.

Laughing, they escaped the chaotic kitchen and sat down to each side of Padfoot.

"So what do we do now?" Amy asked.

"How about we tell Padfoot a bit more about our family," Leo suggested. "We could show him some pictures."

Amy looked at him strangely. "Yeah right. As if a dog would be interested or even understand family stories and pictures."

But Leo just pointed at the eager expression of the dog and stood up. "See, he is really clever. I'm going to get the photo album."

When Jack came back home from school, he heard his two children laughing and talking.

"...and to our ninth birhtday they gave us this book about experiments. In the same evening we tried one of them. We filled a bottle with water, closed it and put it in the freezer. Sometime in the night, we all woke up to a horrible crack. Mum and Dad were so freaked out, you cannot even believe it..." The rest of Amy's tale was drowned in laughter and bark like chuckles.

Jack smiled, put off his shoes and walked into the sitting room, where he found Amy and Leo sitting with crossed legs next to Padfoot, who was looking at the family photo album.

"Hi, I see I have not been missed," he said, grinning at them all. "Have you already eaten?"

Leo and Amy nodded proudly. "Yes, we made spaghetti and even Padfoot liked it." While Amy and Leo were looking at their Dad, waiting for his praise, Padfoot shook his head at him.

"Yes, I can see that. There is tomato sauce all over your shirts," Jack laughed, "Well, I'm sure, Padfoot really liked what you cooked. But I think it would be better, if we got him some proper dog food. As far as I remember he always liked ground beef, right Padfoot?"

Padfoot panted in agreement and the twins laughed at him.

"Now, would you like to go to the supermarket and get some food for him?" The twins nodded eagerly. As funny as their day had been so far, it was much better to be outside than to be cooped up in the house.

"Great," Jack smiled. "Why don't you change in some clean clothes, while I write you a note what else you can buy."

After the twins had left the house, Jack sat next to Padfoot.

"I hope, the twins didn't give you a hard time, mate?" he asked his best friend.

Padfoot shook his head vigourously. He looked much better than in the morning and Jack could tell that the twins already held a place in his heart.

_Maybe that makes it easier for him to accept that he might never transform back again,_ he thought concernedly. "Sirius," he began, the smile gone from his face, "When I told you not to transform in the morning, it had nothing to do with the Volcanis Curse."

The dog tilted his head askingly. Jack sighed. "When we died, we somehow were transported into another world, were we live on, grow older...some kind of parallel universe or something like that. Don't ask me to explain it, I don't understand it myself. Fact is that in this world, there is no magic."

Jack paused, not knowing how to go on, but Sirius had already understood. Shock and anger were clearly visible in the dog's face.

"Sirius, please listen. I know it will be hard to go on living in dog form, but Lily and I are working on returning to the wizarding world. Maybe you can even help us. Let me tell you, what happened to us after we died."

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A/N: Finally. So that was chapter 10. Sorry that it took me so long. But I'm afraid that for the next chapters you will have to wait so long as well, as exams are approaching for me :-(

All the same, I would be happy if you sticked with the story. In the next chapter the twins will finally learn about the wizarding world


	11. Telling the Truth

**Chapter 11 – Telling the Truth**

When Leo and Amy returned from the supermarket, Jack still wasn't finished telling Padfoot everything that had happened since this fateful Halloween night in 1981. Sirius's head was swimming with all the information James was supplying him with. The thing he wondered about most was why James could only remember the wizarding world after such a long time, while he and Lily had taken all their memories straight into this other world, they were now living in.

Sirius was grateful for the break that came with the twins returning from shopping. He was also looking forward to something _good_ to eat.

Jack took the groceries from the children to put them away in the kitchen. When he opened the kitchen door, he gasped.

"Amy, Leo," he called with forced calm. "Would you please come over here?"

The twins joined their father at the kitchen door. The kitchen looked even worse than they remembered. Also, after the sun had been shining through the kitchen window all afternoon, an unpleasant smell had begun to develop.

"Er...yeah...," Leo began very eloquently, but didn't know how to continue.

"I'd rather not found such obvious evidence that you have cooked today in the kitchen," Jack said, looking intensely first at Leo and then at Amy.

Leo and Amy automatically stepped back from their father. When he employed this kind of voice to make such seemingly cool comments he usually was only instants away from losing his temper.

"Er...I'm sorry," Leo said meekly. "We just forgot."

Jack sternly arched an eyebrow at his son. "Forgot?" Then he breathed deeply and sighed. "I know, you don't honestly think I believe that. So why don't you just clean up the kitchen now and then maybe we can go outside in the garden to have some tea?"

Leo and Amy nodded and Amy smiled sheepishly as she quoted one of the favorite sayings of her father, "A task is only done after it is wrapped up!"

Jack grinned indulgently and tousled the hair of his daughter. "Yep, exactly. Now go and finish fixing lunch."

While Leo and Amy started cleaning the kitchen, Jack put some of the beef in a large bowl and gave it to Padfoot, who immediately started munching enthusiastically. Having fed his best friend, Jack went to set the table for tea on the porch in the little garden behind the house. Just when he was carrying the cups outside, Liz called as she had promised that morning.

"Good afternoon, love," Jack greeted his wife cheerfully and took the phone outside to sit in the sunshine.

"You sound like you had a great day," Liz teased him. "I take it, Padfoot and the children behaved themselves."

"By and large they behaved quite well. Leo and Amy cooked lunch by themselves today and made a mess out of the kitchen. They are cleaning it up now. Padfoot and the children are getting along really great." Jack turned around in the chair to reassure himself that the twins were doing fine.

"They were cooking? Wow! And how did they do?" Liz asked, amazed. The twins had never shown much interest in cooking.

"As I said, they made a mess out of the kitchen. But I guess they were quite satisfied with their spaghetti, although Padfoot wasn't too thrilled about their cooking."

Liz laughed lightly. "I can see that. Doesn't he absolutely detest anything that has to do with tomato, when he is in his dog form?"

"Yes, but he must have been really hungry, seeing as he ate almost half of the portion they gave him," Jack joined her laughing. "But they went and bought some ground beef for him this afternoon."

"Poor Padfoot, I bet he was really relieved about that," Liz smiled.

Jack nodded. "Oh yes, he was." Then he sobered and continued in a more serious tone. "Leo and Amy spent already quite a lot of time with Padfoot and I think they noticed that he is not just any dog. Yesterday they asked me why Padfoot appeared in the building we marked on the map, and today Leo asked me how old Padfoot actually is."

"Hm," Liz pondered how to answer those admittedly clever questions of her children.

"I thought it best if we told them the truth," Jack interrupted her thoughts.

"What?" Liz asked, startled. "James, we can't! They would never believe us. The truth is just too incredible. And what would be the use of it, as there is no way to get back into the wizarding world anyway?"

"But they have a right to know. It's an important part of our familiy. And they know that there is something we are hiding from them. Lily, do you know how it was killing me that I didn't know what was wrong with you when you had all those dreams? It hurt me that you wouldn't tell me. I thought you didn't trust me," Jack finished quietly.

Several silent moments passed, before Liz finally sighed. "But do you really think they are old enough for that?" she asked.

"They are old enough to have figured out quite a lot so far, aren't they? Lily, they ask intelligent questions, they have proven that they are ready to know and that they are willing to understand."

"Alright," she said after heaving a heavy sigh. "But I'd like to be there. They can wait one more week, can't they?"

Jack nodded to himself. "Yes. I told the children that I would tell them everything today. But I guess it is better that the whole family is together for such an important issue."

"I need to get going. There is going to be a press conference for the quarterfinal game England vs. Spain tomorrow night. You are going to watch this, aren't you?"

"Of course," Jack said enthusiastically.

"Alright. I'm going to be really busy during the weekend. I'll call you on Monday," Liz told him. "Tell Leo and Amy that I love them, and Padfoot too."

"I will. Have fun at the quarterfinals," Jack said and hung up the phone.

When he returned into the house, Leo and Amy were still working hard cleaning the kitchen. Jack decided to take pity on them and helped them with the rest. With united forces they finished soon after and went outside on the porch to have some well-earned tea and ice cream. Jack also carefully carried Padfoot, who had already finished his meat, out into the sunshine. Padfoot growled indignantly about being so helpless that he needed to be carried, but he also seemed grateful for the warm and fresh summer air.

"Mum says hi and she loves you," Jack informed his children, as they were sitting around the small round table, a huge bowl of vanilla ice cream with fresh strawberries in front of each of them. "She is amazed that you cooked lunch by yourselves."

Amy and Leo glowed with pride. Then Leo put his spoon down. "Dad," he began. "Yesterday you said that you would tell us, what M.o.M. on your map means, and why we found Padfoot there."

Padfoot also looked up, as Jack answered. "Yes, your Mum and I also talked about this on the phone. I know that I said yesterday, I would tell you as soon as we are home, but your Mum and I decided that we should wait until next week, when she is back home."

Amy frowned about that and Leo looked for a moment, as if he wanted to protest. But then, both children just nodded. "But really. Next week we want to hear the story," Leo said eagerly.

Jack smiled about his son and assured him that as soon as Liz was home, they were going to learn the truth about the family.

The weekend passed in sweet idleness. Father, children and dog spent the long June days mostly in the garden, just sun-bathing in the soft, green grass, playing cards, Padfoot watching them, and looking at some more pictures and telling stories.

On Saturday evening, they watched the football game between England and Spain. The whole family was thrilled to witness England enter the semifinals.

During the next week, Amy and Jack had to go to school again, while Leo stayed home with Padfoot. Amy, who had never been to school alone, missed her brother a lot, especially as her class mates were still angry with Leo and her about messing up the class trip. So she usually sat quietly in the back of the classroom, trying to ignore the glares in her direction and taking comfort in the thought that the summer holidays would start after this week was over.

Leo on the other hand enjoyed spending time with the unusually clever dog. Even though they were both limited in their movement and couldn't run and play outside in the nice summer weather, Leo and Padfoot didn't get bored. One of their favorite pastimes was Leo reading a book aloud and Padfoot lying next to him, listening. It didn't take long for boy and dog to develop a deep friendship. Sometime in the middle of the week, Leo was amazed to learn that Padfoot was even intelligent enough to play memory with him. Padfoot also convalesced very well, and by Tuesday, he could already stand up and walk some steps.

In the evenings, when Amy told Leo what he had missed in school, Jack usually told Padfoot more about this world and about Liz's and his efforts to find a way back. Jack also tried to ask Padfoot about the wizard world, but was very limited in doing so, as he could only ask questions which could be answered with yes or no. This way he found out of Voldemort's sudden disappearance linked with his and Lily's death, Voldemort's comeback, Sirius's imprisonment in Azkaban, and Harry being the best Gryffindor Seeker in a long time.

Right now he was trying to find out how Sirius had died. "So it wasn't the Volcanis Curse, which caused your death, otherwise you wouldn't be alive now," he observed.

Padfoot hobbled towards the window and tore at the curtains with his muzzle. Jack looked at him, confused. Then he laughed disbelievingly. "Come on mate, you don't want to tell me that you got killed by a curtain?"

The dog turned towards his best friend and scowled at him, while he snarled angrily.

"Wait, you are serious about that, aren't you?" Jack's eyes widened in shock. "That's why the twins found you at the Ministry. So the Veil of Death really exists."

Padfoot nodded and sat down heavily on the floor. He didn't notice Jack's eyes light up excitedly.

"Padfoot, do you realize what that means?" he asked his friend. "That veil must be a gateway between our worlds. If we could just find its counterpart here, we might have a chance to get back," Jack speculated enthusiastically. What would he give to return to the world where his first-born son lived and fought an entirely unfair fight. What would he give to help him bring down the dark wizard who had torn their family apart and who had so many other innocent people's misery to answer for.

James had been happy with his life as Jack Pearson, but since he had retrieved his memories of the wizarding world, he couldn't get it out of his mind and it felt much more real and important to him than the world he and his family were living in now. If there was any chance for returning into his home world and the children were willing to follow him and Lily, he would gladly take it.

Padfoot shook his head doubtfully, but Jack wasn't ready to give up hope. "Really, this might be the most promising lead, since we started searching for a way back. I can't wait to talk with Lily about that."

On Wednesday evening, Jack, the twins and Padfoot gathered around the TV once more. After an enthralling match against Germany with penalty shots in the end, England missed the opportunity to enter the final. Now Jack, Padfoot, Amy and Leo could hardly wait for the European Cup to be over, as it meant that Liz would come home then. Amy and Leo wanted to finally hear what the big mystery of their parents was, Jack was dying to tell Liz of his ideas about the Veil of Death, and Padfoot was looking forward to seeing his best friend's wife again. After all, he had been unconscious when the family had met in London because of him.

So when Liz finally came home late on Monday evening, she was surprised to find a very excited family, dog included, awaiting her in a nicely decorated living room, having prepared a huge welcome dinner and greeting her enthusiastically.

Even though the dinner consisted of ordered pizza and ice cream for desert, as Jack wasn't able to cook much better than Leo and Amy and the twins didn't think their cuisine was worth the mess it involved, Liz was touched by the gesture. She gave her husband and each of her children a big hug and a kiss, before she turned to the newest addition to the Pearson family.

"Hi Padfoot," she said softly and stretched out her hand to touch his black fur. "I'm glad to see that you are feeling better."

Padfoot returned her gaze, an odd mixture of sadness and happiness in his eyes as he licked her hand in greeting.

Sirius felt it hard to keep eye contact with his best friend's wife. He had missed her and was happy to see her again. But at the same time he felt so guilty. He had promised to take care of her son, his godson. And he had failed them both, Lily and Harry. First, he hadn't been there to raise Harry because he was in Azkaban and then, he got himself killed. He had failed.

Sirius had had those feelings before and he had felt a bit guilty towards James as well, but when he looked into those eyes of the woman who made anyone want to be a better person, he suddenly had the feeling that he hadn't done enough.

As if she could read his feelings, Lily knelt down to Padfoot and pulled the dog into a huge hug. "Sirius," she whispered into his ear. "I don't know, what happened in the last fifteen years, but I know that you did everything you could to make sure that Harry is safe."

Padfoot pulled away from the hug, wondering if he really was this easy to read, and waggled his tail, grateful that she understood and happy to have her back.

When the family finally settled down to eat, Leo and Amy did their best not to burst with curious questions about the past of their parents. Finally, Jack, who was surprised by their self-control and patience, took pity on them and approached the topic they had been waiting for.

"Now, what your Mum and I are going to tell you, is a very long story. So why don't we finish eating and then find somewhere comfortable to sit," he suggested when they were almost done with their pizza.

They all agreed and took the ice cream with them into the sitting room, where Jack and Liz sat on the sofa, Amy took the armchair, but Leo was content to sit on the floor next to Padfoot.

Several moments passed, as Jack picked at his ice cream in silence, not really knowing how to start. Finally, he cleared his throat and looked up.

"Leo, last week you asked me how old Padfoot really is..." Jack began and noticed his son watching him curiously. "Padfoot was born on October 18th 1960," he said and waited for his children to calculate the age of the dog.

It didn't take long for Amy to exclaim, "But Dad, that's impossible! Then he would be almost as old as you!"

"Yes, that's right," Jack said calmly. "As you have already noticed during the last week, Padfoot is not a normal dog. In fact, he is not a dog at all, he is my friend Sirius."

Amy stood up angrily. "Dad, you promised to tell us the truth. Instead you make fun of us by telling us some stupid fairy tales!"

"Amy, please sit down," Liz said, while she stood up herself and put a calming hand on her daughter's shoulder. "I know it is hard to believe, but please let us tell you everything. Your Dad is telling the truth. Padfoot is really Sirius."

Reluctantly Amy turned around to the dog, who seemed to have a silent conversation with the dumbfounded Leo. Slowly Leo turned to his sister. "Amy," he said quietly, almost not believing himself, as he was saying, "I believe them. But how is that possible? How can a man be a dog?"

Liz took a deep breath, knowing that everything else they wanted to tell their children, didn't sound much more probable than a man turning into a dog. "It is possible, because Sirius is a wizard, such as your Dad and myself," she said bracing herself for another round of disbelieving protests of her children.

Instead, they stayed surprisingly calm this time. "Okay," said Amy sceptically. "So you you can do magic, right?"

Jack shook his head. "No, we can't. We lost our magical abilities fifteen years ago."

Amy just snorted, but Leo quickly did the math. Suddenly his face lit up with an idea.

"Wait," he said slowly, trying to catch his train of thoughts. "Sixteen years. It was Peter, wasn't it? You said, he betrayed you, right, and by doing so, robbing you of your other friends." He was speaking quite fast now, excited that everything fit together. "By that you meant that you other friends are still wizards and you are not, so you can't communicate anymore. Now for some reason Sirius has lost his powers, too. That's why you can have contact with him, but at the same time, he cannot become a man anymore!"

Leo finished and looked around proudly in the now extremely silent sitting room, to find four pairs of eyes staring at him.

"Er..., what?" he asked, suddenly very self-conscious.

"That...is the stupidest story I have ever heard!" Amy said, looking at her brother as if he had completely lost his mind.

Jack shook his head, but didn't take his eyes off his son. "No, it's not, Amy," he whispered amazed. "Your brother got it figured out. It's a bit more complicated, but he pretty much summed up the basics."

While the rest of the Pearson family still recovered from their shock about Leo's sudden insight and understanding, Padfoot fondly and proudly muzzled the left hand of his new friend.

Finally Jack and Liz had regained their speech, so that they could continue their story, based on what Leo had said.

Even though Leo had figured out what had happened to his parents, it was hard for him to process everything in such a short time. But for Amy it was even harder. On a rational level, she understood everything, what her parents had told them and to a certain degree she knew it was true, but that didn't make it much easier for her to believe it.

They had stayed up long into the night, talking about the wizarding world, about their brother Harry, who was deeply involved in a war against the evil wizard Lord Voldemort, and about Jack's and Liz's theory that the Avada Kedavra Curse wasn't really a killing curse after all, but propelled its victims into another world. Only, the ones staying behind couldn't know that, so it made no difference after all.

Finally though, exhaustion from working at the European Cup had caught up with Liz, and they decided that they all go to bed.

So, soon Amy and Leo were lying in their beds, the light turned off, and each enwrapped in their own thoughts.

"Well, but at least our wish came true," Amy whispered before turning around into her sleeping position." We got to know one of the other Marauders."

-

A/N: Well, that was chapter 11. I hope you liked it, and if you did please review. I only got one review for chapter 10 :-( Next chapter will be about an "Unexpected Sign"


	12. An Unexpected Sign

sorry, it took me forever to get this chapter online. i had it ready for some weeks but i couldn't load it up during the holidays. now the semester starts again and i have more regular internet access. and you won't have to wait too long for chapter 13. i promise ;-) so have fun with this.

**Chapter 12 – An Unexpected Sign**

"Ha, I'm first!" Laughing, Amy threw her bike on the lawn in front of the house, as she sweatily and triumphantly watched Leo and her parents turn into the driveway with their own bikes. Padfoot was running along, his ears flying in the wind.

The Pearsons had used the last day of the summer holidays for an extended bike tour. Tomorrow, school would start again for both the children and for Jack. Liz had already been working during almost the whole summer, but had taken the day off.

Even though the Pearson family had not gone on a real vacation this year, the summer had all but flown by. Halfway through July, Leo finally had gotten rid of his cast and Padfoot had recovered so far that he often joined the twins on their explorations of the nearby forests or on trips down to the beach. Leo and Amy had been somewhat tense around Padfoot during the first few days after the revelation of their parents' story. Knowing that he was actually a grown up man it had felt very odd to scratch him behind the ears or to play with him. But soon they had gotten used to it and found it quite exciting to have a friend who united the best qualities of a human and an animal within himself.

Sirius, too, had enjoyed the summer holidays. When he had first arrived here in June and had learned that he might never turn back into a man, it had been quite a shock to him. But with friends as Jack and the twins, it made the permanent life as a dog much easier to him than he had dared to imagine, at least as long as the holidays lasted. Once school started, they would lead their everyday lives, had tasks to fulfil. Jack had work to do, while the twins were in school, learning, having fun – all without him.

Enviously, Padfoot watched Leo and Amy putting their bikes into a wooden shed behind the house. Tomorrow they would use them to go to school while he, Sirius, would be cooped up alone in the empty house – yet again.

His head hanging, he trudged through the open front door, along the corridor and finally let himself collapse on his favourite blanket in front of the sofa in the living room.

When Jack entered the living room, Sirius feigned sleep. He didn't want to deal with his friend's attempts to understand him or to cheer him up. He just wanted to wallow in self-pity in peace.

He felt how Jack sat down next to him on the floor, leaning his back against the seat of the sofa. Padfoot grunted and turned around in his "sleep".

"Mate, I've known you for too long to fall for this," the annoyingly patient voice of Jack penetrated his sulking thoughts. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to ignore his friend.

"Sirius, would you do me a favour?" Jack asked casually.

Padfoot sighed and turned to face him, knowing that it was useless to ignore him any longer.

"You know how Leo and Amy had been pestering me all last week that they can go to school by bike instead of taking the bus?"

Sirius nodded warily.

"Well, it's a pretty long way, and Lily and I are a bit nervous about letting them go all by themselves, and I thought that you maybe could accompany them," he asked and slightly tilted his head, as he looked down at the dog.

Sirius sighed, but then grinned reproachfully at Jack. It was unbelievable how Jack knew exactly what was wrong with him and what he could do to make him feel better. He had seen right through his friend's real motives for this favour. Of course the twins didn't need someone to look after them. Jack only wanted to provide Sirius with something to do, but he appreciated it all the same.

Jack smiled. "Great," he said cheerfully. "And if you want, you can meet me in the park near the school after lunch. I'll have a P.E. class then, and I guess I'm going to let them run some laps."

Days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months as the school year went on. Jack and Liz had tried to find more information on the Veil, but as Padfoot seemed to have appeared from out of no-where and there wasn't any portal of any kind near the house were he had been found, this proved more difficult than they had hoped. And soon they had hit a dead end.

Three times a week, Jack, Leo and Amy still went to Tae Kwon Do practice. In the beginning, Padfoot had accompanied them every time and was amazed to watch them fighting, but as he had never been someone to only watch instead of being active himself, he now only came along sporadically.

Amy and Leo had become so used to cycling to school together with Padfoot that they didn't even mind the cold and wet weather in November and December. Sometimes, when the roads were very slippery, Liz tried to persuade them to take the bus instead, but they now saw Padfoot as a fellow "Twister" and would never let him down.

Accompanying the twins to school everyday and usually meeting them during lunch break, Padfoot had become quite well-known at the school. Even when the twins had lessons, there were always some other students, who were willing to spend some time with Padfoot, and one of the teachers had even suggested to involve him in the celebrations for the 150th anniversary of the school, which was going to take place in July during the first week of vacation. In the twins' eyes, that was a brilliant idea, and Padfoot, too, thoroughly enjoyed the idea of showing off in front of so many people and being admired by them.

So as the summer came closer, Padfoot and the twins spent many, many hours plotting their performance. Those meetings usually consisted of the twins suggesting many different things, Padfoot trying those and several ideas of his own and just ragging around. Padfoot wasn't a friend of serious practicing, instead he very much preferred improvising and the twins enjoyed his approach as well.

For Liz, the last two weeks of June were extremely strenuous. First, one of her three colleagues in the sports section of the Exeter Express had had a car accident and was in hospital and soon after that another one had caught a nasty flu, and especially in early summer there was always so much to do in writing about sports. So she had been left off to working on the oddest of hours and usually was so exhausted when she came home that she went straight to bed, only to wake after some few hours of dreamless sleep to hustle to work once again.

She was really grateful to Jack and Padfoot for taking such good care of the children, but still she felt too stressed out and unbalanced to show her appreciation. It drove her crazy that she hadn't seen Harry in her dreams for ages and she couldn't shake off the disturbing feeling that something important had happened in the wizarding world, which she had missed.

When Liz went to work one Thursday in the beginning of July, she was very relieved to see that both of her colleagues had returned to work and gladly took the offer of her editor to take the next day off work.

Friday began really nice for her. She slept really late, making up for the lack of sleep she had had in the last weeks. She had finally dreamt of Harry again. He was back at the Dursleys, which struck Liz as slightly odd, as the school year shouldn't have been over yet.

Padfoot stayed home with her that day, and it was nice to spend some time with him. It was amazing how much Sirius had gotten used to his life as a dog, how easy it had become for the children and Jack to communicate with him. For Liz it wasn't this easy, as she wasn't around Padfoot so much. Jack usually told her what he had learned from Padfoot about the happenings of their world.

Amy and Leo came home early from school that day.

"Yeah, that was it!" Leo shouted happily.

"Finally summer break!" added Amy.

They had some ice-cream and fruit instead of lunch, because it was such a hot day, and then they and Padfoot went outside into the garden again to practice for their school festival performance. The anniversary was only a week away and their show was almost ready to perform. They had decided to feature Padfoot as candidate in a quiz show.

Liz enjoyed watching them practice. It was amazing to see Sirius Black actually working on something productive for school-related purposes. The children took turns in asking multiple choice questions to Padfoot, which he answered by running to one of three areas, one standing for A, one for B and one for C.

After some hours of practice, Leo and Amy critically pondered about what they had so far.

"Something is still missing, isn't it?" Leo asked.

Amy nodded. Then she turned to her mother. "Mum, what would you say?"

Liz tilted her head in thought. "I think you have a really good idea there, with this quiz show. Maybe you could add some more physical action?" she thought loudly.

"Yeah," exclaimed Amy enthusiastically. "Padfoot, what do you think? You could do something, like jumping through a loop, every time you know the answer."

Padfoot nodded eagerly as well, then ran away some meters and jumped through an imaginative loop.

"That's a great idea," Liz praised them. "Why don't we go to Exeter tomorrow for some shopping, to get your loops. Your Dad needs a new suit anyway. Then we could have some lunch in town and on the way back, we could stop at Powderham Castle," she suggested.

"Yes, let's do that. Good idea. That's going to be fun," the twins cheered in a tumble.

So the next morning saw the Pearson family and Padfoot leaving for Exeter. They parked near High Street, the shopping district of Exeter.

It was a beautiful summer day, and many people strolled through the streets, which were lined with small stores. They spent the morning with buying the loops and the suit for Jack. Liz also found a nice pair of shoes for herself. Doing all the shopping, Padfoot got slightly bored and Jack had the feeling that he and the twins soon would start some mischief. So when Liz had exited the shoe shop, Jack suggested that they should look for a place to have some lunch.

They chose one of the restaurants with tables outside and sat lazily in the sun, chatting about the up-coming school-performance, while they were waiting for their food.

"So, Amy will read the questions and I will hold the loop for Padfoot to jump through," Leo told his father excitedly. "Do you think, the other students and parents will like it?"

Jack laughed lightly. "I'm sure they will. The three of you put together quite an impressive show."

"We need to try out how high Padfoot can jump in the afternoon. Maybe you can even kneel down, Leo, and hold the loop over your head. That would really look cool. Do you think, you could do that, Padfoot?" Amy asked

Padfoot perked up his head and nodded, scoffing playfully, as if this question was an insult to his jumping abilities.

Liz laughed about the enthusiasm of her children and Padfoot. "I guess you can just try the whole show in the afternoon and see how high the old dog can jump."

Padfoot scowled at her, but then sniffed the air delightedly and only moments later a waiter with their food approached their table.

"The steak and chips for the young lady and gentleman, the omelette with fried mushrooms and fried potatoes for the lady, the salmon with broccoli and potatoes for the gentleman." The waiter put huge plates with huge portions of good-looking and pleasant smelling food in front of everyone and also put a large bowl in front of Padfoot . "And the ground beef for the dog," he added.

The large amount of food and the sun had made them all content and a bit sleepy. So they sat in the restaurant a bit longer, after they had finished their meals, enjoying the beautiful summer day, before they got up to return to the car.

Liz and Jack would have liked to watch the charming shop windows in the narrow street a bit more, but Amy and Leo were walking rather fast, as they were looking forward to visiting the Powderham Castle. They had been there some years ago with their primary school class, and they had liked it very much back then.

Sirius was trotting along in front of the children. For him it had been a great day so far. He always enjoyed seeing something different than his home and the school of Jack and the children. He had gotten used to being the family pet of the Pearsons, but at times it could get boring to be a dog. So he welcomed entertainment, whenever he could, and family day-trips were his favourite kind of entertainment.

Suddenly Sirius heard something through the steady buzz of voices and cars. He had heard a name – a name he knew very well – a name, which he shouldn't hear here.

He stopped abruptly to listen intently. Leo, who was walking close behind him, nearly fell over him.

"Padfoot," he exclaimed startled, "What's wrong with you?"

The dog ignored him and stared into the direction where the voice saying the name had come from.

Liz and Jack had now caught up with them and looked around curiously to see what had caught Padfoot's attention. They were in a crowded cobbled street, to their right were a flower shop and a book store and across the street, there was a souvenir shop with lots of t-shirts and postcards outside in front of it.

"Padfoot, what is it?" Liz asked curiously, as the dog had his eyes fixed on the book store.

Noticing, where Padfoot was looking, Jack laughed. "Hey, old chap. I know you have taken a liking to books, since the children are reading them to you, but I didn't know, you were this amazed by a book shop," he joked.

Was Sirius imagining things? Had he just heard the name again? Why had James had to start speaking to him right now? Well, he would never know the meaning of all this, if he didn't look for himself.

Determinedly, he barked and started running through the open door of the book shop, towards the source of the voice.

"Hey, Padfoot, wait!" called Jack, "You can't go in there. They don't allow dogs in their shops!"

But Padfoot had already entered the shop. Sighing exasperatedly, Jack put the bags with all their shoppings into Liz's arms and ran after his friend.

The shop was much darker than the light-flooded street outside, and Jack needed some moments for his eyes to get used to it. But then it wasn't much effort to find Padfoot. Customers were pointing, partly annoyed, partly amused, but some also afraid, at the huge black dog, who was running around wildly between the book cases, stopping once in a while to listen or to look around.

A clerk was already trying to shoo him outside of the shop again, but was clearly afraid to go too close to him.

"Padfoot, stop this," Jack yelled angrily over the chaos.

The clerk furiously rounded on Jack. "Sir, is that your dog?" He didn't even wait for an answer and went on immediately, " Sir, dogs are not allowed in here! Please leave him outside! And if you can't control your dog, you need to put him on a leash!" he ranted, angrily and shocked about the dog wracking havoc in his shop.

Jack ignored him, ran towards the children section at the far end of the shop, where Padfoot was running along another book case, and leapt forward to grab his friend from behind. "Padfoot, what's gotten into you," he whispered fiercely.

The clerk, who had talked to him before, closed in on him again, and had already started another angry rant. Liz and the children had now entered the shop as well, and Liz was trying to calm down the furious clerk.

"Sir, we apologize for the behaviour of our dog," she said. "We are already on our way out. Look, there's no harm done."

And really, judging from the chaos and the noise level, which had prevailed in the bookshop only seconds before, it was surprising to see that there was no damage at all.

The clerk looked around in his shop, astounded to still find it in one piece, but then he rounded on Liz again, "No harm done?" he yelled. "Your dog scared the heck out of my customers! Out! Out!"

Liz started to leave the shop, leading Leo and Amy outside as well, while Jack wanted to take Padfoot outside with him. But the dog wouldn't budge.

Instead, Padfoot tore at the sleeve of his shirt and barked excitedly.

Jack and Liz looked at the dog, trying to figure out, what he wanted to tell them, while the clerk was snorting in rage.

Behind them an argument between a pudgy red-haired girl and her mother, which had been interrupted by Padfoot, started anew.

"But Mum," the girl whined, "Abby said that the book is really good. She talks about Harry all day long. Mum, please..."

"Kate, next week is your birthday. I'm not buying you something now," the mother said with a final tone in her voice. She grabbed the book, her daughter was holding and put it back on the shelf.

It was then that Amy saw the reason, why Padfoot didn't want to leave and had come in here in the first place. He must have heard the quarrel of the mother and her daughter, when they had passed the store.

"Look," she shouted disbelieving and pointed up to the book shelf.

The book had a colourful cover, the most striking object was the front of a glaring red locomotive, with _Hogwarts Express_ written on it. Above it hung a small white sign, saying 9 ¾. In front of the train stood a young boy with dark hair, very round glasses and a lightning bolt-shaped scar on his forehead. Above it stood in huge letters:

HARRY

POTTER

_and the Philosopher's Stone_

J. K. ROWLING


	13. A Story from another World

**Chapter 13 – A Story from another World**

"Now, would you please take your dog and leave this shop!" Liz and Jack were interrupted in their staring at the book by the rude and angry voice of the clerk.

Liz forced herself to look away from the title, which mentioned her oldest son and told Jack and the children to take Padfoot outside with them and wait in front of the shop, while she would buy the book.

Liz took a deep breath and reached for the book up in the shelf. Her heart was thumping wildly as her hands touched the smooth paper, protecting the hard cover.

_Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone_

It was unbelievable. How could someone, some author, know about her son? Was this book even about her son at all, or was this all a huge coincidence, a cosmic joke of fate?

She turned the book around, trying to calm herself down enough to read the blurb.

On the left side of the back cover there was a young man in a purple wizard's robe, a giant book under his right arm and and a pipe in his left hand. On the right side there was a short text on what the book was about.

_Harry Potter thinks he is an ordinary boy - until he is rescued by an owl, taken to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, learns to play Quidditch, and does battle in a deadly dual. The Reason: HARRY POTTER IS A WIZARD!_

_Crazy! Just crazy!_ she thought, shaking her head. Almost like in a trance, the book clutched tightly in her hand, Liz went to the checkout to pay for it. The clerk scowled at her as he typed in the price, but Liz didn't even notice.

"What took you so long?" Jack asked impatiently when she finally exited the shop.

"Look at this!" the words bubbled out of Liz. "This book is really about him! It's really about Harry," she rattled on excitedly.

"Let me see!" Amy rushed forward to take a closer look on the book.

"Is that really our brother?" Leo pointed at the boy on the cover in amazement.

Liz nodded. "Well, he looks a bit different. It's a drawing after all and not a fotograph. His hair is darker and not so tidy, but you can recognize him," she said quietly, still stunned about the possibility of finding a sign of her lost son in a bookstore of all places, open for all the world to see. Only the rest of the world would assume the book would be just that. A nice children's novel.

There was an awkward pause as the whole family stared at the book, not really knowing what to say.

"Well, what now?" Jack broke the silence.

"Let's go home and read it," Amy suggested eagerly.

"Yes, we can go to Powderham another time. Let's go home right now," Leo agreed.

Jack and Liz shared a half anxious, half excited look and shrugged. "Okay then, why don't we go back to the car."

Padfoot barked excitedly and ran some steps in the direction of the parking lot, then turned around and watched them impatiently as if to tell them to hurry up.

For none of them the car ride from Exeter to Dawlish had ever felt so long, as they rode in silence, each lost in their own thoughts of what would be written in this book.

The book itself lay in the trunk together with the hoops, Liz's new shoes and Jack's new suit. Liz had thought it best to put it away during the drive, as she didn't want the children to read ahead.

When they finally arrived at home, Jack put the shoppings away, while Liz prepared some ice tea and fruits and gave Leo and Amy some blankets to carry into the garden, so that they all could go outside to read.

Everyone hurried up with their tasks and shortly after the Pearson's and Padfoot sat gathered on a blanket under a large chestnut tree in the garden, ready to start reading the book.

They had decided to take turns reading out loud and Jack would begin.

He cleared his throat and took a deep breath, while he let the book fall open on his lap.

"_Chapter 1, The Boy who lived,_" he read with dry voice. He had to drink some ice tea, before he could go on. "_Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much..._"

Jack read on. Liz, Amy, Leo and Padfoot listened attentively, although especially the children interrupted him several times with comments such as "So, Petunia Dursley is your sister, Mum? Then Vernon and she are our aunt and uncle! Urgh!" said Leo.

"Are they really like this?" asked Amy curiously.

Jack snorted in disgust and nodded, while Liz looked at him reproachfully.

When Jack reached the part, where Hagrid brought Harry with the flying motorcycle, Padfoot started barking excitedly and the twins looked askingly first at him, then at their parents.

But then Jack read Hagrid's answer of where he got it from, "_Borrowed it, Professor Dumbledore, sir," said the giant, climbing carefully off the motorcycle as he spoke. "Young Sirius Black lent it me._"

Leo and Amy grinned at Padfoot. "Wow," Leo exclaimed. "I want to ride on a motorcycle like that!"

But the excitement about the motorcycle didn't last long. Padfoot, Liz and Jack knew already that Harry was going to have to grow up with the Dursleys and the twins dreaded the worst for Harry as well, when Dumbledore put the little boy on the doorstep of Liz's sister.

Learning about how the Dursleys treated Harry put Liz's and Jack's patience to a test.

"If we ever get back to our world I'm going to kick their arses!" Jack growled after he read how Vernon told Harry that he didn't want "any funny business" during their trip to the zoo.

Liz ignored Jack's bad language for once and nodded grimly.

With the book going on and Harry getting deeper into trouble with the Dursleys, first for setting the boa constrictor free and later for getting the Hogwarts letters, it became harder and harder for Jack to continue reading as he was shaking with rage.

But when Liz suggested to make a short break, he just shook his head determinedly. But he didn't say no, when Amy offered to read on.

Amy was just at the description of the pathetic little hut, where Vernon had carried the family off to flee from the letters when Liz gasped, "I dreamed about that. Hagrid must break into the hut any second."

Amy continued, "_A giant of a man was standing in the doorway. His face was almost completely hidden by a long, shaggy mane of hair and a wild, tangled beard, but you could make out his eyes, glinting like black beetles under all the hair._"

Padfoot and Jack nodded. "Yep, that's definitely Hagrid," Jack said, smiling at his wife. "That was the dream you had at the campfire during this one vacation, wasn't it?" he asked and Liz nodded and returned his smile shakily.

Leo put a hand on his mother's shoulder. "Cheer up Mum, he will go to that Hogwarts School now, far away from the Dursleys."

Liz gave her son another little smile and turned to Amy, ready for her to read on.

When Amy had finished the chapter, the sun was already standing quite deep in the western sky and drenched the garden in a rich golden light. A soft cool wind had come up and Liz shivered slightly in the breeze.

"I think, here is a good point for having a small break," she suggested. "Why don't I fix some sandwiches and you put the blanket away and take the dishes into the kitchen. We can continue reading inside then."

Amy and Leo nodded a bit reluctantly. They wanted to know what Hagrid would show their brother. They wanted to know everything about this wonderful wizard world, where their parents had grown up in and in which Harry was about to be introduced.

But judging from their growling stomachs, the suggestion of their mother had its merrits as well. Having become a bit lazy from sitting in the sun and listening all afternoon long, they slowly got up and folded the blanket, while Liz was already on her way into the kitchen.

After putting the blanket and the dishes away, Amy and Leo went into the kitchen to help their parents prepare the food, so that they could sit down to continue the book as fast as possible.

It was Liz's turn to read now. Jack chuckled about Hagrid, when he took Harry to London by tube. "That's so typical Hagrid – talking loudly about all the mugglethings like escalators and ticket machines."

Liz grinned. "Oh, come on, as if you were any better on our first flight by air plane. Do you remember the fuzz you made, going through the security."

The twins looked at each other and grinned. "Oh, Dad, I can imagine what it was like: 'Hey, what are you doing? Leave my wand alone, I still need that,...'"

Jack had grown slightly pink in the face while his children were poking fun on him. "Oh, shut up you two. You have no idea, what it was like. You haven't even flown yourselves yet." He turned to his wife, who could barely suppress her mirth. "Why don't you continue reading?" he said a bit grumpily.

Reading about Harry and his amazement, when he first went to Diagon Alley and drank in its unique atmosphere, caused Liz pangs of sadness. It should have been James and her who had taken their son to this wizarding shopping area, who accompanied him to buy his first Hogwarts robes, his first school books and his first wand.

His first wand. Liz found the passage where Harry went to Olivanders very interesting.

"That explains it!" she exclaimed. "That explains why we were at this graveyard when Harry and Voldemort were fighting each other. It was priori incantatem!" she said breathlessly.

"Mum, what are you talking about?" Leo wanted to know impatiently.

Liz took a deep breath. "You know that your Dad only remembered our world after we both had the same dream about two years ago? We dreamt that we were shadows, coming out of Voldemort's wand. But that really happened, because Harry's and Voldemort's wand have the same cores and when they were cursing each other, the last incantations from Voldemorts wand could be seen – and one of his last magical acts were to kill us," she explained.

Jack had a look of understanding on his face and Padfoot nodded enthusiastically. He remembered how Dumbledore had explained this phenomenon. But Leo and Amy looked totally lost. Amy was just about to ask for further details, but Leo shook his head forcefully.

"Let's read on for now. I want to know what happens next."

Leo and Amy barely listened for the next few pages where Harry spent the last month of the holidays at the Dursleys. They were too excited and eager to know how Harry's new school would be.

Only when Uncle Vernon made fun of Harry leaving from platform 9 ¾, they pricked up their ears. "How can he leave from platform 9 ¾? There is no such thing! Why doesn't Harry wonder about it?" asked Leo.

Liz smiled at her son, "Of course there is. At least in a world where wizards exist. You don't think the schooltrain would leave from an ordinary platform, do you? Think of the attention from muggles that would draw."

Amy shook her head. "Let's just continue the story, shall we?"

Harry's helplessness at King's Cross to find the right platform let Leo and Amy exchange a knowing glance, while Padfoot, Liz and Jack growled at uncle Vernon's and aunt Petunia's gloating and leaving Harry stand alone on this huge train station.

Still, Liz breathed a sigh of relief, when she read, "_'-packed with Muggles, of course-' Harry swung around. The speaker was a plump woman who was talking to four boys, all with flaming red hair._"

"Ha, sounds like the Weasleys to me," exclaimed Jack, while Padfoot nodded enthusiastically.

"Who are the Weasleys?" asked Amy curiously.

"Oh, they are an old wizard family. They all have red hair and usually they have many children. Molly and Arthur Weasley were very good friends with my parents. Arthur and my Dad worked together at the Ministry of Magic," Jack explained.

The twins were immediately thrilled about Fred and George and were quite happy to hear that they helped Harry with his trunk. They also thought it great that the youngest Weasley brother went to sit with Harry on the train – and even more they liked how Harry quickly became friends with Ron and chose him over Draco Malfoy.

Liz and Jack chuckled about Harry and Ron being worried about the Sorting. "I guess it is the same with every new class at Hogwarts," smiled Jack.

"Yes, do you remember how Dwyn Lovegood told everyone how his father had said that we needed to find a Crumple Horned Snorkack in the Castle?" grinned Liz. "I'm amazed that up to now, nobody had told their children how the Sorting really takes place before coming to Hogwarts."

Leo and Amy looked at each other blankly, as Padfoot and Jack howled with laughter. They shook their heads and with their eyes they asked Liz to just continue with the story.

Even though everyone in the room knew that Harry was a Gryffindor, they all listened with held breath as Liz read about Harry's encounter with the Sorting Hat.

"Why does the hat even consider to put him into Slytherin at all? Of course he is a Gryffindor! There should be no doubt at all!" wondered Jack indignantly.

Liz had reached the passage about the Welcoming Feast and as she read the colourful description of the food, Leo's stomach growled loudly.

"Oh my," Liz exclaimed. "It is already past nine! Don't you all think, it would be time for some dinner?"

Jack, Padfoot, Leo and Amy looked at each other uncertainly, not knowing whether their hunger or their curiosity were the larger desires to be fulfilled.

"Well, let us finish this chapter, and then we can eat something, okay?" Liz suggested .

Dinner consisted of some more sandwiches. Liz wanted to fix some proper meal, but as Jack pointed out that they had already had a large lunch in town today, she agreed that sandwiches would do as well.

Leo would read the next chapters. He and Amy were amazed about Hogwarts. The castle itself, the moving portraits, the lessons the young wizards and witches had to learn, (with the exception of Potions with Snape of course) the Gryffindor common room, and most of all Flying fascinated them. More than once one of them exclaimed, "Oh, I would like to see that!"

They were deeply impressed with Harry's performance during Madam Hooch's flying lesson. "Wow, and he never did this before?" said Leo in awe, who could imagine that flying took quite some practicing, even though he had never flown himself.

Jack and Liz had listened raptly as well and now exchanged a look which could be interpreted somewhere between anxiety and pride. "How could he have done that before? He grew up with the Dursleys, remember?" Jack whispered disbelievingly.

Jack was totally thrilled of the aftermath of Harry's stunt during the flying class.

"How cool is that of old McGonagall?" he cheered. "Harry will be the youngest Seeker in over a century or something like that!"

Liz smiled indulgently at her husband, a proud twinkle lingering in her eyes as she told Leo to continue reading.

During the next pages, Leo and Amy started poking more and more fun on Hermione. She quoted stupid rules for every occasion and kept Harry from experiencing fun stuff. When their pointed remarks about her became too much to Liz, after the encounter with the three-headed dog, she frowned. "Harry would do well to listen to someone who has some common sense. He does seem to get into quite some trouble. Really, I wouldn't be surprised if they turned out to become friends."

Padfoot made some amused noise, while Jack rolled his eyes at Liz. Of course, she would know who Harry's friends are. She had probably dreamed about them after all.

Leo, who had missed Jack's look, gaped at his mother. "Mum, how can our brother become friends with someone like that? She is absolutely uptight and seems like a real pain in the – "

"Leo, don't you dare finish that sentence!" she said sternly. "Just read on."

It turned out that Liz was right with her prediction that Harry and Ron would become friends with Hermione, as Leo and Amy realized in shock after they finished reading the chapter where a troll had come into the school on Halloween.

It was Jack's turn to read again and he was thrilled to see that this chapter was about Harry's first Quidditch game. He was so excited to read about his son flying that he sounded more like sports commentator than like someone reading a story book.

He also became really angry about Snape trying to hex Harry's broom.

"You slimy git! What do you think you are doing? That is my son you are putting into danger," he growled dangerously under his breath and Padfoot barked belligerently in agreement.

When Harry caught the snitch in the end anyway, he punched the air in triumph. "That's my boy," he said, his eyes shining with pride. "And Hermione, setting Snivellus on fire – that girl is much better than she seemed in the beginning, isn't she?" he said, winking at Leo.

After the Quidditch match, when Harry, Ron and Hermione talked to Hagrid about Snape, Fluffy and Nicholas Flamel, Leo sighed and said, "Too bad, they don't know that they are in a book and too bad they don't know the title."

Liz, Jack and Amy gave him puzzled looks. "What are you talking about," Amy asked a bit irritated.

"If they knew the title, they would know that a Philosopher's Stone, whatever that is, is under the trapdoor," Leo explained as if it was totally clear.

"That's right," admitted Amy after some seconds. "I hadn't thought about that."

Leo had a smug look on his face, as he turned to his father again to listen to him reading on.

When Christmas approached at Hogwarts, Jack became excited again. "I just thought of something!" he exclaimed. "I got my cloak at my first Christmas in Hogwarts and I told Albus to give it to Harry then, in case we wouldn't be around. I wonder whether he remembered," he said giddily. Then he turned at Padfoot. "You know whether Harry has it now, don't you?" he asked eagerly.

But Padfoot just gave him a look which clearly said that he just would have to read on to find out.

Liz thought for a moment. "Oh, I'm sure he hasn't forgotten. But I doubt he will give him something that would encourage him to break rules already in his first year."

"What cloak are you talking about?" Amy wanted to know.

"Oh, you'll see," Jack answered, smiling secretly as he read on.

As Harry got his presents on Christmas morning, Jack let out a delighted whoop, as if he had gotten the present himself. "He really gave it to him," he said happily. "Now he can go and find the Philosopher's Stone"

"James, you're talking like Prongs again," Liz said appalled and reproachfully. "You are talking about our son after all. Of course he will find the stone, but he will be in such grave danger doing that."

It still took quite some time and some other applications of the cloak, including Harry finding the Mirror of Erised, at which point Liz had tears in her eyes, and Harry and Hermione smuggling a dragon from Hagrid's hut to the Astronomy Tower, before Jack's prediction came true and Harry, Ron and Hermione used the cloak to sneak to the third floor corridor in order to rescue the stone from Snape.

Amy, who was reading now, was impressed with the courage and the team work of Ron, Harry and Hermione. "They complement each other so perfectly," she commented in amazement. "And Leo, they are even three years younger than we are now. That's just so unbelievable what they are doing."

Liz was unusually quiet. She knew what would wait at the end of this obstacle course. She knew that Harry would face Voldemort in only a few pages. She had dreamt about it. Her heart was hammering hard in her chest as she listened raptly how Harry and his friends solved one task after the other, only to get closer to the most dangerous chamber.

Liz sucked her breath in sharply, as Amy read the last sentences of the chapter: "_—then he was on the other side, in the last chamber. There was already someone there—but it wasn't Snape. It wasn't even Voldemort._"

"What?" Leo asked, totally perplex. "Who is it then?"

Liz just shook her head, she and Jack had known that it would be Quirrell, but she hadn't said anything to not spoil the book to the twins, but now she was a bit impatient with their surprise. She just wanted the book to go on.

The encounter with Voldemort was exactly the way she had dreamt it. Only then she had not known what they were saying, as she had never heard any noise in her dreams.

Jack put a reassuring arm around his wife. He hadn't known what Harry had to face down there. Sure Liz had told him once, but she had been a bit vague about her whole dream, and honestly, Jack couldn't blame her after he heard what had happend in this chamber under the school.

"_Harry jumped to his feet, caught Quirrell by the arm, and hung on as tight as he could. Quirrell screamed and tried to throw Harry off—the pain in Harry's head was building—he couldn't see—he could only hear Quirrell's terrible shrieks and Voldemort's yells of, "KILL HIM! KILL HIM!" and other voices, maybe in Harry's own head, crying, "Harry! Harry!"_

_He felt Quirrell's arm wrenched from his grasp, knew all was lost, and fell into blackness, down ... down... down...," _Amy read in a hoarse and an horror-stricken whisper.

There was a pause, heavy with silence.

"That is how far I dreamed. I want to know what happened next," Liz said quietly, visibly shaken.

Amy nodded and swallowed to clear her throat.

They breathed a collective sigh of relief as they realized that Harry was safe in the hospital wing, with Dumbledore visiting him.

Liz and Jack found the conversation between Harry and Dumbledore quite interesting, although especially Jack was somewhat cross with Dumbledore. "Why did he put Harry in danger like that? I'm sure he knew exactly that Harry was looking for the stone and he even gave him the cloak and showed him how the Mirror of Erised worked. Looks like he planned for Harry to find it," he rambled on angrily.

Liz managed a little smile as she remembered that Jack himself was totally delighted that Harry would use the cloak to go after the stone, but she decided not to bring that up now. Instead she listened how her daughter finished the book.

"_Hope you have—er—a good holiday," said Hermione, looking uncertainly after Uncle Vernon, shocked that anyone could be so unpleasant._

_"Oh, I will," said Harry, and they were surprised at the grin that was spreading over his face. "They don't know we're not allowed to use magic at home. I'm going to have a lot of fun with Dudley this summer..."_

Amy yawned and stretched, still holding the book in her right hand. "Wow, that was quite some story," she commented, sounding a bit tired.

"Yes, it's really amazing," added Jack. "I wonder how this Joanne Rowling knows all this stuff."

"Well," Liz said and took the book from her daughter and put it down on the table purposefully. "We should find her and ask her, shouldn't we?"

------------------------------------------------------------

A/N: Stay tuned for Chapter 14, when the Pearsons meet JKR!


	14. Meet the Author

**A/N: **

Dear Joanne Rowling,

In case you ever read this chapter or even the whole story, which I doubt you will, please consider that I unfortunately do not know you. All information I used in making up this character "Joanne Rowling" in my story is from your homepage or interviews you gave. The rest is just my imagination. I have no idea how you would react, in a situation as the one in the chapter. I have no intention of offending you in any way, so please just view the author in this story as a fanfic character, who, by chance, has the same name and job as you.

Sincerely, Loewin

**Chapter 14 – Meet the Author**

"That is so strange to think of a character in a book as our brother," said Leo as he flipped through the pages of "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" yet again. Even though the book was not older than three days, it looked already very used.

"Yes, I know," Amy agreed. "And it's even stranger to think of him as our older brother, seeing as in the story he was three years younger than we are now."

The twins were lying under the large chestnut tree, where they had read the book together with their parents two evenings before. It was the first opportunity for them to discuss the book among themselves without their parents or Padfoot around. On Sunday all five of them had talked about Harry and his adventures all day long, after having slept almost until noon, of course. Their parents had told them about some more customs in the wizarding world and their Mum had spoken openly about all her other dreams in front of the twins for the first time.

Amy and Leo had listened attentively and had eagerly soaked up all information about this other world, but now they were glad as well to talk without someone around who knew everything better than they did.

"What do you think would happen, if we really went to the wizarding world?" Amy wondered.

Leo turned over on his belly and chewed on a straw as he thought about the question.

"I don't know," he said finally. "We could probably help Harry to fight against Voldemort, couldn't we? That would come as a nasty shock to that evil bastard to have Mum, Dad and Sirius coming back from the 'dead'. And us he doesn't even know at all."

Amy shrugged, somewhat unconvinced. "But wouldn't it come as a shock to Harry as well to suddenly have a family after all those years?"

"Yes, probably," Leo admitted slowly, but then was interrupted by their mother's car turning into the driveway. "Look, Mum is home," he said, standing up.

When Liz climbed out of the car and saw her children, a bright smile lit up her whole face.

"Guess what," she beamed at Amy and Leo as they walked over to greet her.

"What, Mum?" asked Amy eagerly.

"We're going to Edinburgh next Saturday," she said and smiled at the blank faces, which met her announcement. "There we are going to meet someone..." she continued to raise the suspension.

"Mum," Leo wailed impatiently after Liz had made no indication that she would continue talking. "Who are we going to meet?"

Liz smiled again and took a deep breath. "Joanne K. Rowling"

Amy gasped. "But isn't that the author of the book? How did you do that?"

Liz winked at her daughter. "Sometimes working at a newspaper helps you to get in touch with people. We will meet Mrs. Rowling on Saturday for tea and she told me to bring my whole family. So we are all going," she said happily.

The following week seemed to crawl by extremely slowly, but when Leo, Amy and Padfoot stood behind the stage of the school anniversary on Friday afternoon, getting ready for their show, it was as if they had only blinked and the week had been over.

"Is it full? How many are there? Where are Mum and Dad sitting?" asked Amy urgently as she watched impatiently how Leo clawed at a small hole in the bluish-grey curtain which covered the back-stage of the school auditorium.

"In the last rows there are some empty seats. Mum and Dad are sitting in the third row to our left," Leo whispered close to Amy's ear to make sure she heard him over the singing of the choir on the stage.

Amy nodded shortly and there was a concentrated silence between the twins as the choir finished and the audience applauded. Padfoot, who was sitting at the twin's feet, yawned pointedly and put his head on his paws. Amy scowled at him, before checking her watch excitedly for what felt like the hundreth time this evening. "One more song, then it will be our turn," she murmured, a hint of stage-fright making her voice tight.

Leo leaned casually sideways against the door frame, leading to the storage room behind the stage, and crossed his arms. He felt as if standing in line for a roller coaster, his stomach flipping with nervousness, but at the same time he was very much looking forward to this ride.

He put a hand on his sister's shoulder and felt her jumping slightly, as he tore her out of her thoughts. He gave her a smile that was only a little bit too bright. "We are going to be great, aren't we, Padfoot," he added with a wink at the dog.

Padfoot nodded eagerly and Amy grinned at him and her brother. "Yep, we are going to be the best," she replied.

The audience clapped again as the choir retreated backstage. The singers gave Leo, Amy and Padfoot encouraging smiles when they passed them. Leo and Amy nodded at each other a final time and entered the stage, Padfoot was following them at first, but overtaking them after only two steps and running a lap on the stage, wagging his tail excitedly.

Amy laughed along with the audience, while she was on her way to the left corner of the stage, from where she would read the questions for Padfoot.

Three large posters were pinned onto the curtain, which covered the backstage area, each showing a large letter A, B or C. Leo was standing in the right corner of the stage waiting.

Amy would read a question with three possible answers and Padfoot would sit in front of the according poster. Then Leo would walk over to him, kneel there and put a hoop over his head. Padfoot would then run another lap and jump through the hoop.

The fifteen questions, Amy read to Padfoot, and which he all answered correctly of course, were over much faster than she would have imagined. Now Leo and she were holding hands as they bowed to the audience, while Padfoot was running yet another lap around them. Amy could feel her heart beating wildly with pride and happiness to the rhythm of the applause.

When the whole show was over, Leo, Amy and Padfoot came from behind the stage, together with some fifty other student performers, to meet the large crowd of teachers, friends and parents, who had watched. The twins took some compliments and backslaps in passing, but had already made out a glimpse of their parents and fought their way determinedly through the crowd to get to them.

"Hey, you were great, all three of you!" Jack smiled proudly at his children and at his best friend.

"I know," Leo said breathlessly and flushed with excitement, "but now we are really hungry!"

"All three of us," added Amy with a broad and slightly silly grin.

Amy and Leo led their parents to one of the food booths, set up on the running track for the anniversary. Finally, all four of them stood around one of those small round tables, each with a bag of fish and chips and Padfoot lying to their feet, chewing happily on a large steak.

Their conversation turned from the show to the meeting with Joanne Rowling the next day quite soon.

That evening, the Pearson family went to bed quite early, as they were facing a long drive the next day. If they wanted to meet Mrs. Rowling at four in the afternoon, they needed to start from Dawlish at seven at the latest.

Getting up at five the next morning was a hard task to achieve, but with the up-coming meeting in mind, even that was manageable for Leo and Amy – and contrary to their father, who was driving, the twins could sleep in the car.

The ride to Edinburgh was mainly uneventful and the first part of the journey passed in sleepy silence. Only after lunchbreak close to Blackpool, it had totally sunken in, who they were going to meet in only a few short hours - the woman who knew everything about the wizarding world and had written a book about it.

"Dad," Leo sat up straight after having a sudden thought. "We want to ask Mrs. Rowling, how she knows about the wizard world, right? But how can we explain to her that we know about it, or that you actually come from there? She will think that we are some crazy weirdos, won't she?" he asked worriedly

Jack threw a short glance in the rear-view mirror to look at his son, then shared a look with Liz, who was sitting next to him. "Your Mum and I actually talked about that yesterday night," he answered.

"I guess we should let her talk at first and I will ask some questions as if interviewing her for my newspaper. Hopefully, she will say something unusual, so that we can pick on that," Liz continued, aware that her strategy sounded a bit thin.

When Jack parked the car close to Nicholson's Cafe, where they were supposed to meet Joanne Rowling, they still had more than half an hour to spare. However, as the children and especially Liz were so jumpy and restless, they decided to go ahead into the cafe and just wait there instead of taking a stroll around the block.

The cafe was not empty, but not exactly crowded either. So Leo, who was facing the door, sat up straight when a tall blond woman entered at four o'clock. He nudged his mother excitedly. "Do you think that is her?"

The woman exchanged a few words with one of the waiters before she advanced to their table.

"Hello," she smiled at them politely. "Are you the Pearsons?"

"Yes, hello. Mrs. Rowling, I assume." Liz stood up to shake her hand. "I'm Liz Pearson. We talked on the phone. This is my husband Jack." Jack rose halfway from his chair as he shook Mrs. Rowling's hand. "And these are my children Amy and Leo." The twins nodded a greeting and beamed excitedly at the author.

"And Padfoot," Liz introduced the dog, who was already sniffing at Rowling and wagging his tail.

Rowling, who had smiled at each introduced family member in turn, frowned at the dog. "Padfoot," she repeated in wonder. Then she shook her head and took a seat between Amy and Liz. "Nice name for a dog," she commented and eyed Padfoot warily.

"Oh, you don't need to be afraid of him," interpreted Leo her uncertainty. "He's really intelligent and he would never bite you," he explained readily. "You know, we only got him a year ago. My sister and I found him on a class trip in London. He was injured and we took him home," Leo chatted on enthusiastically.

Liz just threw a reproachful glare at her son and put a calming hand on his arm to interrupt him, when the waiter Joanne Rowling had talked to upon entering came to their table to take their orders.

After having ordered, Rowling sat back into her chair more comfortably.

"Thank you for agreeing to meet us here," Liz initiated the conversation. "I imagine, you have quite a full schedule with your book having come out just two weeks ago."

Rowling smiled as she shrugged. "Well, not so full. Actually, you are the first newspaper appointment I have."

Liz gave her an encouraging smile. "Oh, that is no problem. To me, the situation is quite new as well. I've never had my whole family come along for an interview before, but all four of us were so amazed with your book that they wanted to come along."

Amy and Leo nodded. "Yes, thanks that we could come."

Rowling looked a bit flattered, and as if she didn't quite know how to respond, she finally settled for asking them what they liked best about the book.

"Hm," Amy thought for a moment, but before she could come up with an answer, Leo interrupted her.

"The Weasley twins of course! They are really funny."

Amy glared at her brother for answering the question faster than her, but then she nodded in agreement.

"I can see that," Joanne Rowling laughed. "I rather enjoyed writing about them, too."

Suddenly Amy's face lit up with an idea. "Their poor teachers," she sighed dramatically. "But better two pranksters than four pranksters, don't you agree, ma'am?" she finished slyly.

Rowling gave her a puzzled look. "What do you mean, Amy?" she asked curiously.

Leo, who had caught on what Amy was planning, was about to answer the question, a wide grin on his face, but a fierce scowl from his sister kept him silent this time.

"I can imagine that even the Weasley twins didn't cause as much trouble as the Marauders, did they?"

"Oh, no they probably didn't," Rowling began to reply cheerfully, before she stopped herself abruptly. Her eyes narrowed, as she stared at the girl, who was looking smugly at her.

"How do you know that?" she asked quietly, her voice nonetheless very intense.

Knowing that their next answer would probably be the most important for the further conversation, the Pearsons shared some nervous glances. Amy already felt guilt creeping up her neck for bringing up the Marauders at all.

Finally, when Joanne Rowling seemed just about to demand an answer for the second time, Jack drew a deep breath and, wishing he had had more time to think about something impressing to say, he started rambling, "You know, it's really complicated and not quite easy to believe, but..."

His wish for more time, was granted when Joanne Rowling's mobile phone rang just in that second.

The call wasn't long, but the time Rowling needed for saying "I'm busy now, I'll call you back later, Chris," was enough for Jack.

Being aware that her attention had never wavered from him and his family, Jack cleared his throat and leaned forward.

"Mrs. Rowling, we do not only know about the Marauders. We know quite a lot about the wizarding world, which is not printed in your book. The reason for that might be hard for you to accept, but please hear us out and give us a chance to prove that everything we are saying is true."

Joanne Rowling watched curiously and obviously in wait for an answer, how Liz took her husband's hand, as he swallowed his nervousness.

"The wizarding world does really exist."

Joanne was staring at Jack disbelievingly, as he continued, "But not only does it exist, everything you have written in your book really happend."

After a few moments of silence, Joanne Rowling raised her eyebrows sceptically. "And you want to tell me that you are wizards, right?" she couldn't help but snort.

"No, right now we aren't," said Liz. "In this world we are muggles, like everyone else. We used to live in the world you described in your book, but we were killed by Voldemort and somehow we ended up here."

"What do you mean, you ended up _here_?" Rowling asked totally perplexed.

Liz shrugged helplessly. "There seem to be different worlds existing. I have no idea how that works, but somehow we came to this world after we died in our homeworld, the world where magic exists."

"No, wait just a moment," Rowling shook her head vigorously. "You want to tell me that you have been wizards, but then you were killed and now you are suddenly muggles and live in a different world than before?"

Liz and Jack nodded carefully, nervously awaiting her reaction to this revelation.

Rowling breathed in deeply, then she slumped into with a great resigned sigh. "Oh great! So, assuming that you tell the truth, I can prepare myself for meeting thousands of 'dead' wizards, who all recognized their homeworld in my book, in the future," she exclaimed sarcastically.

Liz and Jack stared at her. Of all possible reactions that hadn't been one they had expected.

Jack shook his head. "Yes well, maybe. But maybe not. Liz and Padfoot remembered where they had actually come from right after dying, but I was totally clueless until two years ago, when we dreamed of Harry encountering Voldemort and our spirits appeared from his wand at the Priori Incantatem."

Rowling shot up into a straight position, her wide eyes fixed disbelievingly on Jack's face, as the pieces of information clicked into place and gave her a full view on who she actually was talking with.

"You are James, aren't you?" she whispered in shock, before she turned mechanically towards Liz. "And you are Lily," she continued in the same hollow voice. Then she looked down at the dog sitting at their feet. "And is this...are you...Sirius?"

Just in this moment the waiter appeared with their food. While he put the plates in front of everyone, Joanne Rowling still sat there absolutely motionless, muttering, "Impossible, that is just not possible..."

The waiter put a concerned hand on her shoulder. "Are you okay, Joanne?" he asked.

Rowling nodded shakily. "Could you bring me a whisky please, Roger?"

When Roger retreated from their table again, Rowling looked up and her eyes focused on the twins. "You are Harry's siblings," she stated, her voice sounding almost normal now.

Leo and Amy nodded. "Yes, but we were born here. We only know of the wizarding world from what Mum and Dad told us."

"Of course," murmured Rowling, then she looked abruptly at Liz again. "I won't have to worry about other wizards coming to me, because no one else remembers the wizarding world."

Now it was Liz's and Jack's turn to look puzzled.

"James – I may call you James, may I?" Jack nodded absently. "James, you couldn't remember the wizarding world after you died, right? But Lily could – through Harry."

Rowling fixed Liz with her startling blue eyes, which reminded her strongly of Dumbledore in that moment. "Your sacrifice protected Harry from the Killing Curse. And through the bond, your sacrifice created, you could also keep your memories of the wizarding world."

"But how did Sirius remember? He shares no such bond with Harry," Jack wondered.

"I have no idea. Actually I didn't intend to let you die at all in any of my books," Rowling told the dog. "Did he die through a Killing Curse as well?" she asked Jack.

"No, he fell through the Veil of Death, which is situated in the Department of Mysteries in the Ministry of Magic," Jack told her.

Rowling shrugged. "Well, that probably explains it. Maybe this veil is a smoother pathway between the worlds, which allows the people going through it to keep their memories."

Liz nodded slowly. She had no idea how Rowling knew all that, but her explanation sounded plausible. That also reminded her just of the purpose of their coming here at all.

"Mrs. Rowling,"

"Please call me Joanne," Rowling interrupted her.

"Joanne, we are very curious how you know about everything that you have written into your book."

"I have absolutely no idea," Rowling admitted with a blank look on her face. "Harry and his whole world just sort of popped into my mind on a train ride from Manchester to London in 1991. I would never have dreamed that everything I write could actually be true. I still can hardly believe it."

Again, Rowling shook her head in wonder and then she downed her whisky, which had arrived in the meantime.

Liz sighed and stared down at the table top in disappointment. "So you can't help us to get back," she said in a quiet, defeated voice.

Suddenly, the air felt thick and warm like cotton and a strange melody floated around them, which Liz recognized as phoenix song. It couldn't have lasted longer than a few seconds though, and when Liz looked up dazedly after it had ended, she seemed to have been the only one to have noticed anything strange at all.

"I never said that," replied Rowling to Liz's last statement. "I know a way for you to return to the wizarding world." Rowling took paper and pen out of her handbag and scribbled two lines.

She gave the paper to Liz. "Remember, I'm the author. Everything I write concerning your world, turns out to be true." Rowling smiled at the whole family, her eyes sparkling merrily, reminding Liz of Dumbledore yet again. Liz and Jack slowly took the slip of paper from her and read the message on it in puzzlement.

_The mark on an old man leads to a marked young boy _

_A way of transport leads into another world _

_The entrance lies in a Temple_

A/N: Hope you liked that one. Feel free to guess, where the Pearsons will find the entrance to the wizarding world. I'm sure, you will figure it out.


	15. A Means of Transport

**Chapter 15 – A Means of Transport**

Liz, Jack and the twins stuck their heads together over the little piece of paper, trying to figure out the riddle on it.

After some time, Liz looked up. "Excuse me, but why can't you just tell us where we can find the entrance to the wizarding world?" she asked Rowling.

"I –", Joanne Rowling blinked. She seemed to be at a different place with her thoughts, as Liz's question registered so slowly with her.

"I don't know where the entrance is," she admitted with a flat voice.

Jack, Liz and the twins stared at her disbelievingly.

"Really, I have no idea. Only those three lines just popped into my mind out of nowhere – the same way Harry Potter and the whole wizarding world came to me six years ago."

Jack was about to object that this was impossible, that she must have at least some clue, that she couldn't just send them on a wild goose chase with that stupid riddle. But Liz put a hand on his arm to interrupt him, as she remembered the phoenix song she had heard seconds before Rowling had written the little text.

"Jack, I believe her," she said softly. "I trust that the solution of the riddle will actually lead us back to the wizarding world."

Doubting her words, Jack looked intensively at his wife, but when he saw the calm reassurance in her bright green eyes, he nodded reluctantly.

Liz stood up, indicating to Jack and the twins that the conversation was finished.

"Joanne," she shook Rowling's hand warmly. "Thank you for your help and don't worry. We will figure out how to return to our world."

Rowling nodded dazedly, as if the last hour didn't seem quite real to her.

"Bye Joanne," said Jack, standing as well. "Good luck with your future books about our son. He's definitely experiencing enough adventures to fill several of them," he added with a half proud, half playful smile.

When the Pearsons left Nicholson's Cafe, Joanne Rowling stayed at their table, completely motionless, and stared at their retreating backs.

It was already late in the afternoon and so Jack and Liz decided to head directly to their hotel in the outskirts of Edinburgh.

After a short dinner in the hotel restaurant, the whole family met in Liz and Jack's room, all five of them eager to discuss the afternoon with Joanne Rowling and most of all her riddle.

A mark on an old man leads to a marked young boy.

A means of transport leads to another world.

The entrance lies in the Temple

Jack had the slightly crumpled piece of paper in his hand and read it out softly under his breath again and again.

"Well, the young boy is Harry, of course," Amy interrupted her father's chanting. "He is marked with this lightning bolt scar, so this part is quite obvious, isn't it?"

"And the other world is the wizarding world," said Leo, who didn't want to stand back behind his sister. "But what does she want to tell us with this means of transport? Of course you need some means of transport to reach other places. Why mention it in the riddle?"

"No idea, maybe she's talking about spaceships. You can access other worlds with them." Amy said thoughtfully and looked up at her parents to see what they thought of this idea.

Jack shook his head slightly, a frown on his face. "I don't think wizards have too much to do with spaceships, Amy. I would rather say she's talking about broomsticks or floo powder or something like that."

"What's floo powder?"

While Jack told his daughter everything about travelling by fire, Leo was more interested in what his mother was thinking about all that.

Liz had apparently not heard a single word of anything her husband and children were discussing. She was sitting quietly on the bed and had started reading "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" again.

"Mum, what do you think?" asked Leo, a bit annoyed that she wasn't paying attention to their speculations at all.

Liz waved her hand at him distractedly, while she continued scanning the pages with her eyes. "I thought there was...didn't she write...no, it must have been before that..." she muttered under her breath and turned several pages back.

Jack sat down next to his wife, looking curiously over her shoulder at the book. "Do you think the answer is in there?" he asked.

Liz ignored him and the room lay in taut silence while Jack, the twins and Sirius were waiting for Liz to find what she was looking for.

"Hah!" Liz's triumphant cry came so suddenly that Jack, who was still sitting close to her, trying to read along, jumped slightly and Amy cricked her neck looking over to her mother so fast. Sirius echoed Liz's shout with a loud and excited bark.

"'_Yes, he'll have that scar forever.' – 'Couldn't you do something about that, Dumbledore?' – 'Even if I could, I wouldn't. Scars can come in useful. I have one myself above my left knee, which is a perfect map of the London Underground._'" Liz read the passage breathlessly and when she had finished, she looked expectantly around the room.

"A mark on an old man..." Leo thought loudly. "Well, now we know that Dumbledore has a scar, but really, couldn't it be any – "

"Leo!" Jack interrupted his son half laughing, half exasperated. "A means of transport – the London Underground! And the entrance must be somewhere in Temple Station, mustn't it?" He kissed Liz excitedly on the lips. When he withdrew, he grinned broadly at her and his hazel eyes shone with a fire, Liz hadn't ever seen in Jack Pearson's eyes, only in James Potter's. "We will really return to the wizarding world, won't we? We will finally see Harry again."

"But it's not fair! We could help!" Amy exclaimed. Her brother nodded moodily in agreement, but otherwise he wouldn't move out of his sulking position, leaning against the living room wall, his arms crossed before his chest.

"No, you couldn't," Liz responded with forced patience. "Don't you think it would look a bit odd to have a man, a dog and two teenagers lurking around in a tube station day after day?"

"Oh, and nobody would notice if it was just a man and a dog lurking around," grumbled Leo sarcastically.

"That's enough, Leo and Amy! Your complaining will not get you anywhere. Go and get your gear packed. We're running late for your exams."

Reluctantly, Amy and Leo went up to their rooms to pack their _doboks_ and fighting gear. If they passed the exam this afternoon, they would achieve their red belts with black stripes today – the last one before the black belt. Their parents and Sirius would watch the exam, but while Liz was going to take the twins home after the exam, Jack and Sirius would go right on to London, where they wanted to find the hidden entrance to the wizarding world in Temple Station.

After having figured out the riddle and the opportunity to travel to the wizarding world suddenly seeming to be a real possibility rather than a nice dream, the Pearsons had been sitting together many evenings, discussing whether they really should give up their live here. Sirius was of course the one who was most anxious to return. Even though being a pet to the Pearsons was not exactly a bad life, he longed to be a man again, and to see his godson and his friends again. For him the pain of loosing them was still the freshest and there had been enough days when the worry for Harry was almost driving him crazy. He had been the last person who had come close to being somewhat like a parent for him and he didn't much like the thought of Harry grieving for him.

The twins were also quite eager to enter this strange and exciting world, and most of all they wanted to get to know their older brother of course. Liz and Jack were uncertain about their children's attitude. After all, they didn't know the wizarding world and were at home in this world.

For Liz and Jack themselves, the decision to actually travel back to the wizarding world, was not an easy one, either. They were happy in this world after all. They had a house, they were more or less popular in the community and they both had secure jobs – but they didn't have their eldest son. But if they really returned, would Harry accept his family? Or wasn't it just better to leave everything as it was?

However, in the end it seemed quite plain that no one seriously thought staying in this world was the better option. So they decided that Jack and Sirius should go to London to check out how this entrance to the other world worked. The twins and Liz, who didn't want to give up her job until everything was clear, would wait for the men to find the entrance, before they joined them in London.

So, after the twins had successfully passed their exams and had been congratulated by their father and Padfoot, the family parted, with Liz and the twins returning home and the two men heading for London.

The ride to London passed in happy reminiscence of Jack's and Padfoot's times as Marauders. Jack recounted anecdote after anecdote and even though Padfoot was limited to laughing barkingly and not telling any of his memories himself, the two old Marauders entertained themselves just fine. After a while Jack didn't even feel as Jack Pearson anymore, but as James Potter.

Somewhere along the way they were "discussing" how to best find the gateway to the wizarding world without attracting too much attention.

"We should look around the main station and all the places which are in more or less plain view first. We could do that during day time. There are so many passengers then that nobody will care what we are doing." James glanced over to Padfoot, who was sitting next to him, his fur rippling in the breeze from the open window. The dog nodded, waiting for James to go on.

"Well, we probably won't find anything in plain view, will we? So, we will have to check the places which are harder accessible, too. The tracks, the unused tunnels, the areas for the personnel. Too bad that we don't have an invisibility cloak with all those security cameras in the tunnels."

James and Padfoot checked in into a hotel just outside the City of London. As it didn't make sense to start their investigations that evening, James and Padfoot strolled around the city, trying to find a pub or a party where dogs were allowed. They didn't find any and finally settled for listening to a street concert.

The next morning, they got up early and didn't waste any time to come to Temple Station to let their search begin.

As they had expected, there wasn't anything more than modernly lit halls, crowded with commuters in the areas accessible to all. So soon they were starting to explore the less public parts. It wasn't easy trying to find a gateway of which they didn't even know how it would look like, and at the same time trying to avoid attention of the tube personnel, the cameras and most of all, the fast trains rumbling through the dark every few minutes.

James was feeling giddy. With the adrenaline rushing through his veins, he only had to close his eyes and he could pretend that Padfoot and he were sixteen again, that the Underground tunnels were some dark and secret passages of Hogwarts, waiting to be explored by the Marauders.

In the sixth night of crouching through the dank tunnels, Padfoot and James came across a opening, which seemed darker than all the others they had walked by so far. Feeling that they had finally found something of importance, Padfoot and James turned into the passage. It definitely was different. The darkness was so dense that it had an almost substantial feeling to it.

Carefully, James and Padfoot felt their way along the walls, the thin beams of light spilling from their flashlights, penetrating the dark for only a few meters ahead.

After barely a few steps into the tunnel, the sounds of the rest of the Underground network were cut off. A sudden feeling of total isolation and helplessness pulled on James's nerves and the absolute silence pressed like pillows on his ears. He cleared his throat and stepped down a bit more forcefully, giving in to the urge to test, whether his ears were still working at all. However, the noises he produced echoed so unnaturally and alien through the dark that they didn't reassure him at all.

James drew in a deep, steadying breath and automatically stretched out his right hand to find Padfoot before moving on. But even with the dog's warm fur curling underneath his fingers, the indefinite fear, which had grasped his heart, didn't ease.

Looking down at his friend, James noticed that Padfoot wasn't comfortable with this place either. The dog's shoulders were stiff and his ears were twitching nervously as if trying to pick up any sound at all and his tail was tugged between his hind legs.

James returned his attention to the way ahead. This tunnel could be hundreds of kilometres long or merely a few meters, it was impossible to tell.

James turned his head sharply and gasped at the sensation of something cool and slimy touching his left cheek. He raised his hand, trying to identify what had grazed him. There was nothing. But now there was clearly something walking up his neck, something with more legs than he would care for. His left hand shot over to where it was needed – but again he found nothing.

He was breathing heavily now, a hardly controllable panic having settled in the pit of his stomach. It was almost impossible for him to have any clear thought at all. Every single part of his body urged him to leave this place.

James threw a glance at Padfoot, who was eyeing him worriedly. He forced himself to nod bravely at the dog and move on.

An ice cold gust of wind hit James in the face, causing all the hairs on his neck to stand on end.

"Let's leave," he croaked with barely concealed panic.

Padfoot whined in agreement and he and James hastened out of the tunnel. After a surprisingly short time they had reached the track where they had come from. James leaned with his back against the wall, panting heavily. His face looked like ash in the grey light of the Underground and beads of sweat covered his forehead.

"That was quite creepy, wasn't it?" Padfoot could tell that the question was supposed to sound casual but it was impossible not to notice the shaking in James's voice.

The sun was already rising when James and Padfoot returned to their hotel room. Totally exhausted, they collapsed – James in his bed and Padfoot in front of it.

James lay like this for some minutes, his body tired enough to sleep, but his mind reeling with the memory of the unnatural fear he had experienced in this Underground tunnel. The anger that he had just given in to his fear and fled didn't make falling asleep any easier.

Determinedly, he rolled over and rested his chin on his right fist, facing Padfoot.

"I'm sure we were on to something," he said rather loudly. "The tunnel must have led to the gateway."

Padfoot blinked at him. Seemingly, he had already dozed off. But then he nodded grimly.

James got up and started pacing the room. "I've never been afraid of the dark, you know that, don't you?" He didn't await an answer, but talked right on. "And I never had problems with insects or spiders or something like that. This tunnel shouldn't have freaked me out like this!"

James stopped abruptly and stared at Padfoot determinedly. "Listen, there was a reason why we felt such strong fear in this tunnel. It must have been a defence mechanism or something that enhanced the normal fear one feels in a strange and dark environment. Maybe it was a protection for the gate. Tonight we will go down there again and this time, we will follow the tunnel to the end!"

Padfoot barked forcefully in agreement.

The following evening, it took the two Marauders more than an hour to find their way back to the opening of the tunnel in question. It almost seemed as if the location of the entrance had moved. Finally though, they were slowly walking through the tense darkness again, trying to ignore the leaden fear that was creeping through their veins, whispering urgently, telling them to return. Walking very closely together, the two friends advanced stubbornly. The way seemed to take forever and though the scare didn't get worse after a while, it was still nothing to get used to.

The end of the tunnel came upon them so abruptly that they hardly managed to stumble to a halt before it. Barely three feet in front of them, there was a tattered piece of fabric hanging, rippling in a non-existent breeze.

All fear forgotten, Padfoot barked excitedly. The sound echoed hollowly through the dark tunnel and James jumped with fright.

"Don't do that to me!" he panted half scared, half angry. But then he looked more closely at the veil hanging there in the middle of the tunnel. It was made of dirty and extremely old material with many small holes in it, looking as if it would resolve into dust as soon as anyone touched it.

"Padfoot, is that…" James whispered in awe. "Is that a Veil of Death? Like the one in the Ministry?"

Padfoot nodded absently, his eyes fixed on the veil. He was sure that he and James had indeed found the entrance to the wizarding world.

Somehow, the tunnel had lost a huge part of its scariness when James and Padfoot returned to the main network of the Underground. The anticipation of really returning to their world basically carried them back to their hotel. As soon as they entered the room, James reached for the phone to call Liz.

"We've found it!" he exclaimed happily into the receiver, not even realizing how late it was until he heard Liz's sleepy voice answering from the other end of the line.

After a scatterbrained apology for waking her, James excitedly explained everything about the tunnel and he and Liz agreed that she would come to London with the twins the day after tomorrow, so that she could quit her job and pack.

Jack reminded her not to pack more than she could carry and after telling Liz that he loved her, he hung up, grinning broadly at Padfoot.

"We really did it, mate, we are gonna go back."

Liz and the twins arrived in London in the afternoon of August 4th, the twins' birthday. Liz had asked her children whether they would rather wait for a few days to go to the wizarding world in order to have a proper birthday party.

"Mum! That's the best birthday present you could ever wish for – going into another world! Of course we don't want to wait!" was the twins' exasperated reply to this suggestion.

The plan was to enter Temple Station around eleven o'clock at night, when there were only very few passengers. So to pass the time, the family went into town to have a large dinner and James had to tell Liz and the twins everything about finding the Veil. When he came to the part of him and Padfoot stumbling across the tunnel and leaving it for the next day to explore, as he expressed it, Leo rumbled his father immediately and sniggered.

He nudged Amy in the side and whispered. "It's a bit like Shaggy and Scooby Doo running away from a dark and evil place, isn't it." Amy did her best to refrain from bursting into laughter, but couldn't help to let out some amused snorts.

Padfoot growled at the twins and James glared at them. "Hope you can still joke about it tonight," he grumbled, but his lips were twitching. The comparison with Scooby Doo did fit.

When they descended the stairs to the tube station that night, they were each carrying a backpack with some books, pictures and other personal stuff they didn't want to leave behind in this world.

The most difficult part of their journey was the beginning. Once they had reached the network of tunnels unnoticed, it was no problem to get to the Veil. So while Padfoot led Liz and the twins along a way avoiding the security cameras, James ensured that no tube personnel would notice them.

For James and Padfoot, who already knew that nothing dangerous was waiting ahead of them, moving through the tunnel was a lot easier than for the other three. Together, Padfoot and James did what they could to reassure Liz and the twins to heighten their courage. Finally though, the whole family stood in front of the Veil.

For Liz, it seemed almost unreal that such a little piece of cloth was the only thing separating them from her home world.

Taking a deep breath, she looked around at her husband, her children and Padfoot. They all nodded solemnly back at her, indicating that they were ready to go.

Taking each other by the hand and Leo touching Padfoot on the back, all five of them stepped forward and tumbled through the cold darkness

------------------------------

A/N: Congratulation to inkayye! Your the only one who figured it out!

So, that was the last chapter that took place in "our" world. Now it's all back to the wizarding world again. Hope you stay tuned for how their return is accepted by the "living"


	16. Into the Books

**Chapter 16 – Into the Books**

If someone had told Sirius that he could feel such relief and anxious apprehension at the same time as feeling the desperate icy coldness, which grasped the heart of any person who ventured behind the Veil, he would have declared him crazy.

Having gone through the gateway once before, he knew exactly what lay ahead of him and he was looking forward to it. Too bad that he couldn't communicate his optimism and confidence any better when he was in his dog form. So he settled on turning his head and giving Leo, who clutched the fur on his neck tightly, a reassuring and almost cheerful smile.

Soon the familiar falling sensation turned into the feeling of floating weightlessly – not floating away from the tattered curtain, but not getting any closer either. He remembered his panic from one year ago, when he had been frantically trying to get back to the Department of Mysteries, where Harry and his friends had been fighting a bunch of Death Eaters. He wondered whether Bellatrix or any of the others have been brought to justice.

Finally though, James pointed at the Veil and evidently tried to say something. However, no sound emerged from his mouth. But sounds were not necessary. All five of them could see clearly how the Veil was now very slowly moving towards them.

Having been the first to set her foot on this threshold to the other world, Liz was now also the closest to the fluttering piece of cloth, which simple hung there in the middle of nowhere, with no visible means of support.

With one hand holding on tightly to her daughter, she stretched the other hand towards the tattered sheet of fabric, wondering what she would find behind it. Only two more centimetres before she could touch it.

Liz gasped and felt Amy shriek soundlessly in startlement behind her, as the room suddenly tipped and moved on its side. The human chain built of the four Pearsons and Padfoot was pulled forward forcefully, but even before any of them had time to be scared properly by the sudden movement, they landed in a tumble on the floor of another dark and damp tunnel. Even though it was faintly lit by phosphorescent moss or lichens, it was impossible to see further than barely a few feet ahead.

Groaning slightly, Amy and Leo disentangled themselves from their parents and from each other and scrambled to their feet.

Leo looked curiously back to where they had come from, but there was no sign of the Veil or any other kind of gateway, only the blank tunnel, which lost itself in darkness after a few steps. Smoothing out his t-shirt demonstratively, Leo shrugged and turned around to his family. "Well, that was a cool ri—" He broke off, staring at the darkhaired man, who was standing where the dog had been mere seconds before, grinning broadly at him, Amy and their parents.

"We are back," stated Sirius plainly, his voice a bit hoarse from not having used it for more than a year.

James seemed rooted to the spot for a moment, staring at his friend in amazement, before he lunged forward and threw his arms around him.

"We really did it! Padfoot, we are back – You are back!"

He turned half around, one arm still resting on Sirius's shoulder, smiling happily at his wife and children. "Can you believe it? We are in the wizarding world!"

Leo and Amy grinned back, although they were throwing uncertain glances at Sirius once in a while. Even though they had known that Padfoot was in reality their father's best friend from school, it was still strange to see him in his human form for the first time after having lived with him for over a year in his dog form.

Amy cleared her throat to cover her awkwardness about the situation. "So, you can do magic now, can't you?" she asked the three adults in general. "Can you show us something magic?"

Leo was nodding eagerly. "Yes," he said, "and then you can teach us how to do it!" His eyes were shining with excitement and he was bouncing on his feet.

"It's not so easy without a wand," conceded James, "but we could try something simple."

He pointed his finger at nothing in particular and muttered, "Let's see, if I can still do it." Then he screwed up his face in concentration and said, "Lumos!"

At once a thin beam of light spilled from the tip of his finger, painting a small round spot on the opposite wall.

"Cool! – Wicked! – That's almost like E.T.!" exclaimed Leo and Amy delightedly.

Now Sirius stepped forward. "Okay kiddies, watch this!"

He too raised his finger, but then pointed it on the ground and said, "Wingardium Leviosa!"

A pebble soared up in the air. Sirius moved his finger and the little stone was following it, shooting around back and forth through the dark tunnel. After watching the pebble for a moment, James started chasing it with his finger-flashlight.

The twins were cheering them on loudly and excitedly. They still had to wait and see how Sirius was behaving as a man instead of a dog, but from what they had seen so far, he promised to be fun.

"Stop it right now!" shouted Lily angrily.

The pebble fell to the ground with a soft plonk, but otherwise the tunnel lay in uncomprehending silence. "What's the matter?" asked James somewhat worried but mainly offended.

"I don't think you quite understand the situation. We have no idea where we are," she said exasperatedly. "For all we know, we could be right next to some Death eater hide out. Really, I had expected more reason from you."

"Oh, Lily, lighten up! Come here, we haven't even properly said hello." Sirius stretched out his hands at her, tilted his head and smiled his typical puppy dog smile at her. His dark fringe fell elegantly on his forehead and shaded his eyes, making his whole face a study of innocence.

Grimacing at not being able to resist Sirius' charm, she let him come forward and let him hug her, but let go of him after a few moments and growled, "We ought to be more careful. And we should find out where we are." She turned around and, still shaking her head about how two grown-up men could be so irresponsible and childish, she started following the underground corridor, now having lit up her finger, too.

James and Sirius shared a boyish look, which made Leo and Amy roll their eyes and snicker at the behaviour of the two Marauders. Their adventure in the new book world was starting just as they had imagined it. James and Sirius shrugged at Lily's determined pace and gestured the twins to follow their mother, so that they could make up the rear.

The tunnel dragged on and on and on. They must have walked for many hours through the darkness, when the ground finally began to rise. Soon they came across what must have been a staircase many decades ago. Now it was just a steep stretch of moss-covered stony floor, in which one could still assume steps.

They climbed up the staircase with difficulty, having to use their hands several times to keep their balance. After five minutes of climbing, the ceiling didn't rise along with the ground any longer, but tipped into a horizontal level. Just when it was impossible to go any further without actually crouching along on their knees, Lily, who was still leading the small group, found a trap door above her head.

With an asking look at her husband and Sirius, she carefully tried to push it open, but it wouldn't budge. James came crouching forward to help her, stemming his shoulder forcefully against the heavy wooden shield, but even working together, Lily and James couldn't move the door for even one single centimetre.

"It's probably locked," commentated Sirius.

Lily nodded and touched the wood with her palm. "Alohomora!"

Applying the unlocking charm was apparently not working either.

"Hmmm, the Blasting Curse then?" suggested James, looking inquiringly at Sirius and Lily.

Sirius shrugged. "Sure, why not?"

Lily considered the door and the long tunnel where they had come from for a few more seconds, before she nodded reluctantly. "We don't have too many other options, have we?" she sighed. "Best stand back a little," she advised her children.

Amy and Leo backed down two or three steps, but made sure they could still see everything their parents and Sirius were doing. That was going to be so exciting to watch something be blown up by magic.

The adult wizards stretched out their hands towards the door. "On the count of three then," said Lily tersely, not knowing what would await them behind the door. "One – two – three."

"Reducto!" shouted all three of them and the wood above them splintered with a horrible crack and shot upwards. Some of the shards were sprayed into the room above them, but a considerable amount of wood and dust showered Sirius, James and Lily as well.

The five of them stood stock still, listening closely into the heavy silence after the crash. When they could hear no shoutings or footsteps, however, they, Lily, James and Sirius looked at each other and Lily nodded slightly. James stepped carefully under the blasted hole in the ceiling and squinted up through the dust, which was still swirling around.

He couldn't make out anything. The room was just as dark as the tunnel. After another glance at Sirius he climbed up into the room and lit it up with his wandless Lumos-Charm.

"Urgh, that's disgusting!" James muttered as he looked around in the room he was now standing in. It was so small that probably only one or two more people would fit in next to him, and then it would be extremely tight. The room was mostly filled with a large, old-fashioned boiler. Right underneath the pipes lay a heap of dirty and ragged clothes and blankets. They were covered with stale bread crusts and mouldy bits of cheese. Here and there lay some coins or broken picture frames. At the opposite wall of the room he could make out a narrow door.

James raised his eyebrow at the mess and pressed his body between the rusty pipes to get to the door. Slowly and carefully, hoping that it wouldn't creak so loudly, he opened it and peered into a large, dimly lit basement kitchen. The place seemed vaguely familiar to him. He was sure that he had been here before. Realization hit him and he gasped.

"Padfoot," he called softly back into the darkness, where he knew the others were waiting for him. "You are never going to believe where we are."

James looked back to the trap door, where Sirius had already climbed through the hole and now helped his family to climb up as well. The twins joined him at the door to the kitchen after scrambling between the pipes.

"So, where are we, Dad?" asked Leo. Meanwhile they were all standing in the kitchen, as there was simply no space in the boiler room.

"That's my home." Sirius came through the door behind Lily at last. He let his gaze go around the deserted room, grimacing. "Nice to be back," he said sarcastically.

"The Weasleys really know how to celebrate." Tonks grinned and leaned next to the front door while Remus fumbled with the keys. "I can't remember the last time I had so much fun."

Remus turned and looked at her, her bright pink hair glistening in the early morning sun. "I've never had so much fun before," he said softly, looking down, and then taking a decision he raised his eyes to meet hers. "Nymphadora, that was the most beautiful day I have ever had because I could spend it with you."

Tonks grimaced. "Remus, that's really sweet of you to say, but why can't you just call me Tonks?"

Remus smiled flirtingly, if a little unsecure at her, while he tilted his head and tentatively came closer. "Because I was hoping that sometime in the near future we could change your last name into Lupin," he whispered and pulled a small box out of the pocket of his jacket.

But before he could even open it and present its content to Tonks, she stepped back abruptly and gaped at him

"Remus... was that...do you mean...are you telling me... you want to – propose to me?" she stumbled across her words.

They stared at each other for a few more moments, neither of them knowing what to say.

Remus paled as he felt his stomach drop into a bottomless hole. "I... I'm sorry, I thought you were trying to persuade me for... I'm so stupid."

He stuffed the box back into his pocket and turned on his heel, and stormed down the steps. That was apparently enough to wake Tonks from her trance. "Remus, wait! Please wait!"

Remus didn't want to wait. It hurt and it was embarrassing. He had been so sure that Tonks loved him that she was willing to be with him although he was a werewolf. He had thought he had seen it in her eyes, when she had caught Fleur's bride's flowers.

He had told her several times that he wasn't the right one for her, that she deserved someone young and whole. She had made such an effort to convince him that she really didn't care about his being poor or older than her or even this dark curse he was suffering from – and now? Maybe she had seen sense after all and realized that she deserved someone better. How could he have dared to hope?

"Yes!"

Remus stopped. He heard steps running closer rapidly behind him, and then felt a soft hand on his shoulder.

"Remus, yes. Yes, I want to marry you!"

Remus turned around slowly. There was Tonks smiling at him through unspilled tears. "I'm sorry, I was just so surprised...you told me a million times, that there's no way..." She smiled a bit sheepishly at him and shrugged. "Guess I'm a bit clumsy sometimes, am I not?"

Remus grinned, feeling a huge wave of relief and happiness washing over him, before he noticed that Tonks was looking intently at him, asking for permission with her eyes, before she gently pulled him closer to kiss him.

But before she could succeed, Remus put his hands on her arm to stop her. He swallowed hard and said hoarsly, "No, let me propose properly first."

He pulled the little box out of his jacket once more and this time managed to open it in front of Tonks. He looked up and found her eyes with his.

"Nymphadora, do you want to marry me?"

"Yes," she whispered, totally overwhelmed, "yes, Remus, I want to."

Tonks still couldn't believe it. When Remus slid the ring over her finger she seemed to drink in every little detail of his face with his eyes. Every tiny feature of his face fit together to a whole, which she had learned to love during the last two years. From those kind and warm amber eyes to the subtly curved eyebrows, from the straight nose, to the slightly rough and dry lips, from this unique combination of thick brown hair, streaked with black and grey strands to the short white line next to his left eye, a cut from his school boy days.

When the ring was placed on her finger Remus looked up and caught her eyes with his. Seeing the love in them, Tonks realized that it was really true. She was going to marry Remus John Lupin. She couldn't help to let out a whoop and threw her hands around his neck lifting up her legs, so that Remus was basically carrying her.

Tonks felt how Remus was shifting slightly under her weight and she drew back to find him looking at her amusedly. "Don't want to interrupt you, but weren't we going to kiss?" He grinned.

She stuck out her tongue and grinned back at him, before he gently placed his hand around her neck and pulled here in a soft but passionate kiss.

Remus broke the kiss after some moments. "Let's go into the house. Moody would have our heads for behaving so obvious right in front of head quarters."

They ascended the stairs to the front door, where the key was still sticking in the lock, forgotten by both of them in the events of the last ten minutes.

Remus smiled a guilty smile when he turned it around. They opened the door quietly and stood in the dark and musty hallway of Grimmauld Place Number 12.

"I still don't like this house very much," said Tonks with a frown. "We'll get our own place soon, won't we?" she asked softly as not to wake the portrait of Mrs. Black.

Remus smiled indulgently at Tonks as he pulled her into another kiss. Holding her around the waist with his left arm, he opened the kitchen door with his right hand.

"Okay, let's be a bit careful around here," whispered Sirius. "In my will I gave this house to Harry, but you never know whether my dear cousin Bellatrix didn't find a way to get it into her dirty hands," he spat Bellatrix's name with such venom that Leo and Amy exchanged a glance with raised eyebrows.

Lily and James crossed the kitchen and Lily put her ear against the door.

"I can't hear anything," she mouthed to her husband.

James nodded and carefully put his hand on the door knob. Just when he was about to open it, there were noises in the hall. Someone was opening the front door. There were soft voices.

James stepped away from the door and pulled Lily with him, who was on her way back into the room already anyway.

"Someone entered the house. We better hide," he whispered urgently to Sirius and the twins.

They had barely time to duck behind the kitchen counter before the door opened and two people stumbled into the room, totally oblivious to their surroundings, kissing passionately.

When they saw who it was, James and Sirius exchanged a surprised and appreciative grin.

"Oi, Moony," laughed Sirius, "I'm not even gone fourteen months and you are already making out with my baby cousin!"

A/N: Soory it took me so long to update this time, but I was really busy over the holidays and exams are coming up. I try to be faster with the next chapter, where you'll read how Moony reacts to his visitors ;-)


	17. Meeting Point Grimmauld Place

A/N: This is my favourite chapter so far. I hope you have at least as much fun reading it, as I had writitng.

**Chapter 17 – Meeting Point Grimmauld Place**

Remus and Tonks let go of each other as if they had touched something extremely hot. They whirled around, pulling out their wands in the process, and found the two men grinning at them from behind the kitchen counter.

Remus attempted to stand protectively in front of Tonks, but she glared at him, and remembering that she was the Auror and not he, Remus returned his attention to the intruders.

"Who are you?" he asked. It hurt to look at the man who had taken on the appearance of Sirius. Was it just the sick humour of the Death Eaters or was that some way to fool the wards of the house?

Remus took a closer look at the other man and gasped. He looked as James would probably have looked like, if he was still alive. His raven hair was sticking up on the back of his head and through his glasses looked a pair of hazel eyes curiously at Remus and his wand.

Well then, that settled it, it was definitely the sick humour of those guys.

"Who are you?" Remus repeated his question and barely managed not to let his voice break. "And what do you want?"

James grinned his typical lopsided smile. "Oh, Moony, come on. I know we haven't been around for quite a while, but you should at least recognize us."

Remus's hurt turned into anger and hate. How dare those foul Death Eaters insult the memory of his best friends.

Noticing the dangerous glim in Remus's eyes and the not at all amused expression on his face, the grin on James's lips died away.

"Moony, it's really us," said Sirius, also taken aback by Remus's reaction. He had never considered the consequences of his comment about Remus making out with his baby cousin. Of course! Everybody in their right mind would be shocked if supposedly dead people are smart with you, he berated himself. Maybe that was what everybody was talking about when they said he was acting rashly.

He raised an eyebrow at James, who had already started talking to Remus again.

"Remus, how can we prove..." James had his hands spread openly in front of him, asking the question with the most serious and sincere tone of voice.

"Oh James, really!" Lily piped up, standing up from her hiding place behind the kitchen counter.

Remus paled into an even sicker shade of greenish white as he gaped at her. However, two unhealthy flecks of red stood out on his cheeks consistently and, breathing heavily, he pointed his wand at the woman who looked so much like Lily would have looked like, were she still alive.

Tonks, he noticed from the corner of his eyes, was keeping the other two impostors of his two dead friends in check.

"Remus," said Lily gently and carefully, while she held out her empty hands in front of herself. "Please, if you would allow James and Sirius to transform, we could prove that it is really us."

Remus's mind was reeling. What if it was true? Could his friends have come back from death after such a long time? Have they been dead at all? They couldn't have! They have lived on. They have aged! Where have they been?

The slight move of Tonks turning her head to look at him was enough for Remus to snap back to focus on the situation with a guilty start.

Those intruders could have done anything while he had been standing there with glazed eyes, he berated himself angrily.

But they hadn't.

The two men and the woman were still standing behind the kitchen counter, looking at him expectantly, hopefully, encouragingly.

Remus nodded hesitantly, being only marginally aware of Tonks laying her hand on his shoulder.

James and Sirius stepped forward from behind the counter. Standing in the middle of the room, they gave Remus another encouraging smile and closed their eyes for the transformation.

Even before the stag and the dog had fully assumed their forms, Remus had let go of his wand and it fell to the ground with a soft clatter. It felt as if the rational part of his mind had gone somewhere else. But that didn't matter. The werewolf was there and he recognized his pack mates Padfoot and Prongs. It was really them. They had come back.

Remus blinked and the two animals were gone. Instead James and Sirius were standing in front of him again, looking at him worriedly.

A remote part of his brain was wondering how bad he looked to justify the concerned faces of his two friends, before he was swept in desperate hug. Clutching his two long-lost friends Remus couldn't repress the sobs, which were forcing their way up his throat.

The sun was shining brightly into the room, tickling Harry on the nose. Blinking several times, he opened his eyes and yawned widely, before letting his head fall back on the pillow contentedly and closing his eyes with a soft sigh.

Fleur's and Bill's wedding had been the best party he had ever been to. It had lasted till the early morning hours, and only when the sun had risen already, had the last guests left. Therefore he wasn't surprised now, when he found that it was already past noon. Considering how refreshed he felt even after a night of fun and more than one shot of firewhisky, he was deeply grateful to Hermione, who had provided him and all the Weasley siblings with a sobering potion before they had went off to bed.

A soft grumbling in his stomach unmistakeably reminded Harry that he had slept through breakfast. Noticing that Ron was also still asleep, he quietly pushed back his covers and grabbed his morning gown for the short walk down the hall to the bath room.

When Harry finally walked into the kitchen, he found Mrs. Weasley and Hermione chatting amiably over a large cup of tea. Looking at them from the kitchen door, he wondered where they got all their energy from. When all of them had gone to bed this morning, Hermione had helped Mr. and Mrs. Weasley to clean up after the party. Mr. Weasley was probably still asleep, but the two women seemed as if they had been awake for quite a while now.

Hermione noticed him standing at the door.

"Good morning, Harry." She smiled at him. "Slept well?"

"Yes, thanks." He grinned as he entered the room. "Good morning, Mrs. Weasley." He poured himself a cup of hot chocolate and sat down next to Hermione.

Mrs. Weasley was already on her feet. "What do you want for breakfast, Harry, dear? Everyone is sleeping in, we'll just have some brunch until all the others are up and skip lunch," she chattered away happily, loading heaps of bacon and egg on Harry's plate without even awaiting his answer.

Harry couldn't suppress a grin. It felt so good to be at the Burrow, almost like home.

Mrs. Weasley put the full plate in front of Harry and sat down with the two teenagers again. "You know, it feels like it was yesterday that Bill was just a little boy and now he is married," she sighed.

Harry was looking at Hermione, somewhat helplessly. He had no idea what to say to that.

"I'm sure he will be happy with Fleur," said Hermione smiling at Mrs. Weasley.

Harry was totally bewildered now. He knew that Mrs. Weasley was getting along quite well with her new daughter in law, since the night Bill had been bitten by Greyback. But Hermione and Ginny were still poking fun on the young French-woman, calling her Phlegm.

Not knowing how to deal with this strange female behaviour, he was relieved to see Ron coming down the stairs yawning, joining them at the table.

Mrs. Weasley filled Ron's plate generously, before she left the kitchen to do the laundry. Ron nodded a tired thanks and started shovelling huge amounts of food into his mouth. Hermione didn't seem able to decide whether she should find Ron's typical breakfast routine amusing or disgusting and finally settled on rolling her eyes. Harry caught her look and snorted, not exactly knowing, what he found so funny.

Ron looked up, startled. "What?" he asked, accidentally spitting a bit of egg across the table.

Just in that moment Harry realised that this might be the last time that the three of them were having an untroubled breakfast together.

Not wanting to spoil the good mood, Harry shook his head smiling and said, "Oh I just had to think of yesterday. You know, when Bill ate one of those _Sticky-Tongue-Gums_."

Ron nodded enthusiastically, laughing hard. "Yes, that was ingenious!" he agreed. "What a sight, Bill and Fleur being glued together by the lips!"

"Clever of Fred and George to use Ginny for offering the gum to Bill. Otherwise he would never have taken it," said Hermione, also grinning broadly.

Everyone had been a bit anxious about what the twins had planned for the party and had been careful not to take anything offered by either of them. So they had taken Ginny into the plan. She had been to give Bill a Sticky-Tongue-Gum, which caused him to be glued together at the lips with whoever he was kissing next.

Bill and Fleur sticking so close together for more than an hour had been cause to great amusement during the party. Even Molly found it funny and her relief that the twins had limited themselves for something this relatively harmless was clearly visible. Again and again, Bill and Fleur had had to listen to jibes like, "Hey, take your time you two, you've got the rest of your lives with each other!"

"Yep, one definitely shouldn't get on the wrong side of your sister, mate," grinned Harry.

Ron suddenly looked strangely at Harry. "Are you and Ginny still together?" he asked bluntly as only Ron could.

"I..." Harry began. He already felt how the companionable atmosphere they had had a minute before was dissipating and how reality closed in on him again.

"No," he said sadly. Both of his friends were looking at him, Hermione with curious concern and Ron with this wary face of a very protective brother. "Don't get me wrong, mate. I still love her. But it's just to dangerous with Voldemort around. I would never want her hurt," he said softly.

Harry stood up and started pacing. The restlessness he had felt during the long weeks in Privet Drive, and which had vanished during those wonderful days at the Burrow with the excitement of the wedding, had returned with full force.

Having come to a decision, he turned around to his friends. "I'm going up to pack my stuff. I'm leaving tomorrow. I need to finally do something."

Ron and Hermione had known that Harry wanted to start their Horcrux hunt after the wedding, but it seemed so soon. Ron just nodded glumly.

"Harry, wait!" said Hermione, an excited sparkle in her eyes. "I just remember what I heard yesterday at the party and what will help us with the search. I meant to tell you, but I forgot..."

Ron rolled his eyes at Harry. "Hermione, are you rattling on about how you forgot, or are you actually going to tell us?"

Hermione blushed and began. "Bill was talking to one of his former class mates. They were recounting memories of their school days. So, one episode happened in their first year. Bill and his friend had been hexed by a Slytherin Seventh year. All five boys in their dorm planned to do something together to get revenge. They got one of his school books and charmed it, so that it would enlarge itself and float up into the air, as soon as he opened it. It's really amazing for some first years to do magic like that."

Ron groaned. "Great, so how does this information help Harry?"

"Well, if you would let me finish," Hermione huffed indignantly. "Anyway, they also charmed it, so that it was written in bright red and golden letters, _Regulus is the Star of the Lion_"

"Regulus? Do you mean Sirius's brother?" asked Harry, not knowing how this would help him to find a Horcrux.

"Yes, Regulus Black. And I asked Bill, whether he knew his second name. It's Antares."

Ron and Harry stared at her blankly for a moment, before Harry gasped. "R.A.B.," he whispered. "R.A.B. was Sirius's brother. And he tried to destroy the locket. Well, apparently Voldemort has no idea about that, but maybe Regulus showed his repugnance at him in other ways as well. That's probably why he was killed..." Harry fell silent again to think about that.

"So what do we do now? Do you think the locket is somewhere hidden in Grimmauld Place?" asked Ron excitedly. "We could go there now and look for it."

"No, it could be anywhere, we could have accidentally thrown it out while cleaning last year," said Hermione, who seemed to have already put some thought into the topic. "But we could ask Kreacher," she recommended.

"Kreacher?!" said Harry and Ron simultaneously, neither of them sound particularly friendly.

"Yes, Kreacher," she said bossily. "He is our best chance. If he knows where it is, he has to tell you if you give him a direct order, Harry."

"Alright," Harry agreed reluctantly. He still resented the old house elf, and even more since Sirius had died.

"Kreacher, come here," he called out.

Nothing happened. "Kreacher!"

"Maybe he died," said Ron uncertainly.

"Nonsense," replied Hermione distractedly.

After waiting some more minutes, Harry sighed. "What a nice and helpful house-elf," he grumbled sarcastically. Then he stood up and turned to go. "Let's see if we find him at Grimmauld Place."

"What? Now?"

Harry shrugged irritably. "Yes, of course. Why waste time?"

They had to travel to Grimmauld Place via Floo powder as Harry hadn't taken his Apparation test yet. The box with the Floo powder stood next to the fire place, as it had when Harry had travelled by Floo powder the first time in the summer before his second school year.

"Ron, do you think we should tell your Mum where we are going?" asked Hermione.

"Are you mad? She would never allow us to go alone."

Hermione bit her lip. It was one thing to browse Hogwarts' corridors at night, but now they were leaving the relative safety of the Burrow. On the other hand they were travelling to another place, which was secured with lots of wards and protections as well.

"Okay, let's go. But we are not staying longer than ten minutes. We only look if Kreacher is there to tell us what he knows about Regulus or the locket," she said nervously.

The boys nodded impatiently and listening for voices or foot steps of the other inhabitants of the house, they stepped into the fire place one after the other, each of them enunciating "Grimmauld Place" loudly and clearly.

So much had happened on this morning that Remus wasn't even surprised anymore when he learned that Lily and James had two more children. Leo and Amy had been kept in their hiding place by Lily as long as Remus and Tonks were still sceptic and wary about their sudden visitors. Only when the three Marauders had hugged, had Lily let her children come forward from behind the kitchen counter.

After having raided the kitchen for something edible, the small group had sat down together in the sitting room of Grimmauld Place to talk. As interesting and exciting everything had been and still was for the twins, the long walk through the tunnels and being awake all night were taking their toll and soon Leo and Amy had fallen asleep, leaning against each other on the slighty shabby but comfortable sofa.

Tonks was fighting sleep as well and finally around ten o'clock in the morning, Lily decided to find a bedroom for the twins and then go to bed herself.

Nothing however seemed to be able to keep the three men from celebrating their reunion and catching up. Even when Lily lay in bed she still had the excited chatter of the three Marauders in her ears and sometimes the warm and full laughter of the men carried up to her.

When Leo awoke, he didn't know where he was. The bed in which he was lying was unfamiliar and he had never been in the room before. He sat up abruptly and looked around. In the bed on the far wall was his sister still sleeping.

Above his bed there were two small windows through which the sun was shining brightly. Leo guessed that it must be well after midday. He yawned and his eyes caught the portrait, which decorated the otherwise empty wall between the two beds. Something was stirring in the picture. Leo stood up and carefully walked over to the dark and seemingly empty canvas.

Leo gasped. There was a man walking into the picture.

"Mmmmm?"Amy had apparently been woken up by Leo's sudden intake of breath. "Wuddissit?" she mumbled from beneath her blankets.

"Amy, look at this! This picture is moving!" Leo exclaimed excitedly, suddenly remembering all the events of the previous day. It hadn't been a dream. They really were in a world where magic existed.

"Of course I'm moving. It would be a rather dreary existence to stand stock still at all times," sneered the man in the portrait. He didn't look friendly. He had a thin and clever face with a pointed black beard and wore long silver and dark green robes.

"Amy, the picture can talk, too," he called, now totally amazed. Amy scrambled out of her bed to get a good look at the picture as well.

The man looked at them with raised eyebrows, pulled his lips into a disgusted sneer and turned his back towards the twins, walking out of the picture again.

Leo and Amy grinned at each other, started snorting and soon their laughter was so unrestrained that their rips started hurting.

"What a stuck-up fellow," gasped Amy when she could finally talk through her laughter again. "Come on, let's see what else we can find in this house," she said and was already opening the door to the hall.

The were stepping on a narrow landing when they left the bedroom. The hall, in which they were standing breathed something strange and mysterious and something – dark.

"Well, Sirius said that his family weren't the friendliest wizards," whispered Amy, looking around the dusty hallway cautiously. The three rooms which they had seen so far of this house had been made more or less comfortable, but the hall still had a slightly unnerving air.

"Let's see if we can find the kitchen or the sitting room. They had seemed okay to me, and we should be a bit careful around here, shouldn't we?" said Leo reasonably.

Amy nodded and quietly they descended the massive wooden stairs. Amy thought she saw some kind of shrunken heads mounted upon plaques on the wall, but she quickly looked away from them.

Despite themselves they breathed a sigh of relief when they had found the kitchen. The large stony room was empty. The used dishes from this morning were still standing on the table.

"Want some tea?" asked Leo, filled a kettle with water and put it on the stove. While Amy put the dirty dishes into the sink, Leo rummaged the cupbords for cups and sugar.

Suddenly, there was a noise coming from the fireplace of the kitchen. Leo and Amy stared at each other, but before they even had the chance to decide what to do next, the fireplace roared to live with bright green fire and a boy was falling out of it. Two more times within the next seconds the green fire roared up and two more people fell out of it, a boy and a girl.

Not having noticed the twins yet, the three teenager scrambled to their feet.

"That must be Harry, Ron and Hermione," whispered Amy to her brother.

The heads of the newly arrived snapped up and they stared at the boy and the girl whom they had never seen before, who knew their names and who were standing in the kitchen of head quarters of the Order of the Phoenix.


	18. Family Reunion

**Chapter 18 – Family Reunion**

With their brother and his two best friends looking at them curiously, Leo and Amy suddenly became aware of the heavy weight of responsibility on their shoulders. They were the ones who needed to tell Harry the truth about him not being the only Potter any longer in this world, or at least prepare him somehow for it until their parents woke up. But how could they tell someone, who had been an orphan for all his life that not only his parents had returned from the dead but that he also had a brother and a sister now?

While their thoughts were still running in wild circles about how to start an explanation, Hermione had asked something and was now looking at the twins in wait for an answer.

Amy snapped out of her thoughts, and noticing Hermione's gaze, she blushed slightly. "Excuse me? I didn't pay attention."

"I said, we had never seen you at Hogwarts. And I wanted to know, how you know us," the older girl replied patiently.

"You're right, we are not attending Hogwarts. We...we read about you," Leo blurted out.

Amy could see how Harry rolled his eyes and she couldn't help to grin at him, apparently that answer didn't surprise him so much, considering how famous he was and how the newspapers must write about him quite often.

"Harry," came Hermione's startled gasp. "Harry, did you see that?"

After having shaken his head and having waited for several seconds, what he had been supposed to see, he turned around to Hermione irritably. "What?" he asked.

Hermione ignored him and looked very closely at Amy, her face showing a mixture of curiosity and suspicion. "You...what's your name?"

"Oh, sorry. My name is Amy and that is my brother Leo," she said and stuck out her hand to the older girl.

Hermione shook it distractedly, before returning her attention to the two boys again.

"Doesn't it strike you, how similar those two look to Harry?" she asked, pointing at Leo and Amy. "Amy even has exactly the same grin as you, Harry."

Hermione was now looking back and forth between Harry and his siblings as if she was following a tennis match, while Ron and Harry exchanged doubtful glances.

Biting her lip, Hermione looked at the twins once more, gathering up the courage to ask the question she had been wondering about, ever since the similarity of the to teenagers had caught her eye.

"Are you relatives of Harry?" she asked fast, as if it was easier to get over with it quickly.

"I have no living relatives!" Harry cried inadvertently, irritation being apparent on his face.

Seeing Harry's vehement reaction to Hermione's question, Leo bit back his answer, exchanged a worried look with Amy and both of them remained silent.

"Where did you read about us, anyway?" Ron broke the uneasy silence, trying to stir the conversation away from the topic, which apparently upset Harry.

He received a grateful glance from Harry and an angry stare from Hermione simultaneously.

Leo smiled. An idea had occurred to him how the three Hogwarts students might believe them who they were and where they came from without shocking them too much.

"We read about you in a book. It's called 'Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'," he told them.

"I don't know that one," admitted Hermione with a frown.

Harry and Ron whirled around to stare at their friend. "WHAT?"

While Ron danced a small jig and sang, "There is a book she doesn't know, dup di do...", Harry shared a thoughtful look with Hermione, but then shrugged.

"Oh well, I guess there must be some books about me out there," he said carelessly. "With me being their 'Chosen One'," he added sarcastically.

"It's not a history book or something like that. It's a novel for children," said Amy, not exactly knowing what her brother meant with 'Chosen One'. "Why don't you come upstairs with us? Then we could show you."

Harry, Ron and Hermione shared a shrug. They didn't know the two teenagers and in times like these it probably wasn't wise to trust someone they didn't know. Especially Harry had a funny feeling about these two. But on the other hand were they in Grimmauld Place and that was still protected by the Fidelius Charm so there had to be a reason that they were able to be in this house. And they didn't seem to have wands. Where they wizards at all? Still, not wanting to take a risk, Harry drew his wand and walked up the stair behind everyone else.

Some time later the five teenagers entered the bed room, where Leo and Amy had awoken this afternoon.

It was the same room, Harry had shared with Ron when they spent their last summer and Christmas at Grimmauld Place, and while Ron sat on the bed, which he had occupied last year, Harry stood uncertainly in the doorway. It hurt to remember the time he had spent in this house when Sirius had still lived here.

Swallowing back those painful memories, he watched Amy go over to the bed, in which he had slept when he was here during the last holiday, and rummage in a backpack which leant against the head piece of the bed. A few moments later she took out what she had been looking for – a used looking book with a colourful cover.

With a look at Harry she gave it to Hermione who was standing next to the bed on which Ron was sitting.

Hermione frowned at the cover but didn't say anything, so that Ron pulled her down next to him.

"What is – hey that book is broken! The pictures don't move!" he declared indignantly and tried to pry it out of Hermione's hands.

Hermione glared at him and looked curiously at Amy. "Is it a muggle book?"

"Oh, Hermione, don't be stupid! Why should the muggles write a book about Harry and his first year at Hogwarts? How would they even know about it?" asked Ron with a superior voice, probably being proud that he had thought about an aspect of the matter, not even Hermione had considered.

His eyes widened disbelievingly, when he saw Amy and Leo nod in answer to Hermione's question.

Even Harry decided to get over his uneasiness now and join his friends, who were examining the book. He sat down at the other side of Hermione, just when she opened the mysterious book to look what was written into it.

Curiously Harry scanned the randomly opened page and grinned.

"Look at this!" He pointed at a line. "Do you remember that? That was the night we found Fluffy."

_"You don't use your eyes, any of you, do you?" she snapped. "Didn't you see what it was standing on?"_

_"The floor?" Harry suggested. "I wasn't looking at its feet, I was too busy with its heads."_

_"No, not the floor. It was standing on a trapdoor. It's obviously guarding something."_

_She stood up, glaring at them.  
"I hope you're pleased with yourselves. We could all have been killed - or worse, expelled._

_Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to bed."_

_Ron stared after her, his mouth open._

_"No, we don't mind," he said. "You'd think we dragged her along, wouldn't you?"_

_But Hermione had given Harry something else to think about as he climbed back into bed._

„Hermione, you were such a nightmare in the beginning of our first year," laughed Ron. "Honestly, you've come a long way since then." He endeavoured for a fatherly voice and patted her shoulder benevolently.

Hermione didn't smile. "It's not good," she muttered, scratching her forehead in thought. "It's not good at all. So dangerous..."

"Don't want to interrupt, but it is kind of hard to know what you're talking about, when you're just babbling incoherent nonsense," grumbled Ron irritably.

"Oh think, Ron," Hermione snapped. "How can that possibly be in there? We never told anyone about that, did we!" She looked inquiringly at her two best friends, but when she saw them shaking their heads slowly with a frown, she slammed the book shut.

"That book is dangerous! Imagine what it could do in the wrong hands! Imagine Voldemort could read everything about our thoughts, our behaviour, our strengths and weaknesses!" She shuddered at the thought.

"Don't worry!" Leo used the uneasy silence Hermione's words had created. "This book is the only copy in this world."

Deep frowns formed on the foreheads of the two wizards and the witch simultaneously.

"What do you mean?" asked Harry at the same time as Ron repeated "This world?" incredulously.

"Excuse me," began Hermione in a bossy voice, which made the two boys smile slightly. "It's rather confusing when you only tell us random details. Why don't you start at the beginning."

Harry and Ron shared a raised eyebrow. "Look who is talking. Should take her own advice sometimes, shouldn't she?" muttered Ron darkly.

He was ignored as Leo and Amy settled down at the other bed, getting ready to tell their story.

"Well, the book was written by Joanne Rowling, a muggle author, who lives in some kind of a parallel world, where magic doesn't exist," began Leo hesitantly.

The more than sceptic looks he earned from Ron, Hermione and Harry told him that this would be harder than he thought.

"Okay," drawled Ron, "So where did **you** get this book from then?"

Feeling that they wouldn't believe her, Amy fumbled with her fingers while answering. "We brought it with us. We arrived from this other world just in the morning," she said, looking at her audience expectantly.

They didn't comment but were staring at Amy, waiting for her to continue.

Amy blushed under the intense glances. "Well anyway, for almost everyone at home the wizarding world exists only in books and fairy tales. All of you are nothing more than characters in a book for them."

"Hey, I'm real!" interrupted Ron indignantly. "I'm not just some invented character!"

"We know," said Amy in a placatory way. "But most other people in our world aren't aware of that." Then she continued her explanation. "Some people, who die in your world, are not really dead at all but are only transported into this other world, where they live on."

Harry's heart missed a beat. Sirius! His parents! Was it possible that they were still alive? That they weren't dead at all, but trapped in another world, damned to lead a life as muggles. Maybe they would find a way to return to the wizarding world sometime. There must be a way. The children had travelled between the worlds as well. Or maybe he should try to find a way into this other world. Maybe he just had to get himself killed...and then Voldemort would win.

Who guaranteed him that the children were telling the truth? What if Voldemort had sent them. Did he think he could coax Harry into committing suicide with this cock-and-bull-story? Did he really think Harry would believe this nonsense of other worlds and afterlife? How stupid did they all think Harry was?

He heard how Ron asked "So were you also killed in this world?"

"No," answered the girl. "We were born into the other world, but our parents have been wizards."

"Of course!" Hermione said, her eyes shining in a way, they always did, when she had figured something out.

"So you really are relatives of Harry! Are you cousins or even his si—"

"Shut up!" whispered Harry dangerously and stared menacingly at the twins. "Shut up and get out of here! I'm not believing a single word you're saying!"

Four startled pairs of eyes turned toward him. "Harry, what's wrong?" asked Hermione worriedly.

He whirled around at his best friend. "What's wrong? I tell you what's wrong. We've been sitting around here for far too long, listening to the lies of people we don't even know, with nobody knowing where we are." He grew louder with every sentence, almost shouting the last one. Realising his loud voice, he blinked and cleared his throat. "We should go back," he said flatly and turned to go.

"But Harry," said Hermione urgently. "What if they are right. What if they really are your siblings."

"They aren't", said Harry with such calm sureness that it hurt in Amy's and Leo's heart.

"Hermione, I think Harry is right. We don't even know them. They could be sent by You-know-who..." Ron trailed off, when he received Hermione's glare.

"Harry, don't be stupid!" All the evidence pointed towards the twins being right. Why couldn't the boys see that? Especially Harry should be jumping at the possibility of really having relatives. He doesn't want to get his hopes up, realized Hermione a moment later. He is afraid of being disappointed again. "Harry, look at the similarities between Leo and Amy and yourself. You should at least listen to what they are saying. Don't you want to find out, whether they really are your siblings?" she said gently.

"Having black hair, which is hopeless to fight against, doesn't make anyone my brother or sister," he hissed, feeling betrayed that Hermione didn't share his distrust into the children.

"Now, are you coming back to the Burrow or will you rather stay with them?" he snapped and made his way towards the door.

Ron uneasily watched his two best friends glaring at each other. Not being sure, what to think, Ron shrugged apologetically at Hermione and joined Harry at the door.

Hermione was clearly torn. You know, you should go with them," mumbled Amy. "Sorry, we didn't want to create a rift between you, or something like that," she added nervously.

Hermione sighed and got up to leave together with the boys. "Don't worry about it. We'll come back later."

"Yeah sure," muttered Harry and opened the door.

Amy and Leo looked sorrowfully at each other after the door had closed behind the three wizards. They had imagined the first meeting with their brother to go differently. Maybe they hadn't quite hoped for him to fall around their necks, but that he wouldn't acknowledge them at all was hard on them.

"Well, I guess it is really hard to believe," conceded Leo. "And we can't transform ourselves like Dad and Padfoot did."

"At least Hermione believes us," consoled Amy. "Maybe she can talk with Harry and he will give us another chance. And then we could try to get Mum and Da—"

Loud screaming downstairs interrupted Amy.

Amy and Leo jumped to their feet, flustered. "It sounds like a fight. They are attacked! Come on, we have to help them!"

They darted through the door and hurried down the stairs.

On the last landing Amy stopped so abruptly that Leo ran into her and almost knocked her down the stairs. The scene, which played out in front of them just looked bizarre. Harry, Ron and Hermione were standing in the middle of the hallway, being shouted at by a slightly plump woman with red hair. All three of them were looking down and while at least Harry and Ron were probably a head taller than the screaming woman, they looked so miserable right now that they almost seemed smaller than her.

Behind the three teenagers was a portrait with another woman, screaming her lungs out, but being ignored by everyone present.

Between the screeching of the two women it was impossible for Leo and Amy to make out any coherent sentences at all. Only fragments were coming through to them. "...use your brains before acting"... "Filthy mudblood"... "been so worried" ... "bunch of bloodtraitors" ... "expected more sense than that"...

Amy and Leo were so rapt by the spectacle downstairs that they hardly noticed Sirius passing them, grimacing about the loud and shrill nagging of the two women.

"Hey, what is all that racket about?!"

He pushed his way through the children and ran down the last set of stairs, to pull the curtain over his mother's portrait shut again. Molly went silent as well, staring at Sirius as if she was seeing a ghost.

After having successfully put the portrait to sleep again, he took a deep relieved breath and turned around to Molly and Harry. He didn't know how his godson would react to seeing him here, whether he would be as suspicious and cautious as Remus had been, but he had been looking forward so much to see him again.

Harry was staring at his godfather, unable to say anything.

Hesitating slightly, Sirius closed the distance between them carefully and took Harry in his arms. When he had fallen through the Veil in this horrible night in the Department of Mysteries, he had never hoped to ever see the boy again.

After a moment of going stiff in Sirius's arms, Harry returned the hug, clutching his godfather so forcefully that Sirius's ribs started hurting. "You're back. You're really back. They were right." Harry said it again and again, as if he had to convince himself that he wasn't dreaming.

He knew it was impossible that Sirius was back and at the same time he knew that it was really him. Amy and Leo had told the truth. But that meant...

He drew back and swallowed hard. "So, my parents are there too?" he croaked, hoping that he would say yes and dreading that he would say no.

Sirius looked up over Harry's shoulder and Harry turned around to follow his gaze. Up there, at the landing, next to the twins – they really were his siblings, he realized with wonder – stood Lily and James Potter. They looked a bit tired and cold in their pyjamas, being woken up by the racket, which had been going on some minutes earlier.

Harry felt that his heart was swelling to a huge lump, which set uncomfortably in his throat and if it grew just a little more it would explode. He had never felt so much happiness before. His parents were standing there, not even five metres away from him, alive, smiling at him.

He let go of Sirius and walked forward two steps, when he stopped, a sudden fear gripping his heart. How many stories had he heard of his parents? How often had friends of them told him what they had been like? And Harry had loved to listen to them. His parents had been heroes to him – far away and infallible. Until last year when he had gotten a glimpse of what his father had really been like for the first time in a pensieve from the memories of Snape – and it had been a nasty shock for Harry.

What if his parents were totally different from the image of them he had had all his life?

As if she had read his thoughts, Hermione put a soft hand on his arm. "They love you Harry. That's what counts," she said softly.

Harry looked up and saw in their faces the same insecurity and nervousness he felt, but he also saw hope, happiness, pride and love. He smiled gratefully at Hermione, nodded and walked up the stairs.

A/N: Sorry that you had to wait for so long. I'm quite busy now with writing my bachelor thesis. I promise to do the next one before easter, though.

Now, one more very emotional chapter to go, before I move forward with the plot again. Reviews are appreciated, as I feel a bit insecure with all the soppy stuff :-)


	19. Catching Up

A/N: Hi, just before Easter, here comes chapter 19. Might be, that there are still some grammar mistakes in there as I hurreid so much. But I can edit them later ;-) for now enjoy, and I wish you happy Easter.

**Chapter 19 – Catching Up**

The situation sinking in slowly with Molly, she shook her head, trying to regain her composure. She had no idea what was going on. What had happened in the thirty minutes Harry, Ron and Hermione had been gone? Was it possible, what she was seeing here in the hall of Grimmauld Place? Was it possible that three apparently dead people were now alive? She couldn't possibly judge the situation, not having known what had been going on here, but people returning from the dead just seemed too fantastic. And yet, Harry and Hermione were apparently convinced that it were really Lily, James and Sirius, who were standing in Sirius's house with them. But what if the children had been fooled or jinxed into believing it?

The situation seemed peaceful enough, but what would happen if Harry reached the people, who he thought were his parents?

"Harry, wait!" shouted Molly.

Harry ignored her and continued walking up the stairs. "Harry!" she shouted again and starting running after him.

Hermione blocked her way. "Mrs. Weasley, leave him. Don't worry, it's really his parents."

Molly realized that she would never reach Harry in time. He was only a step away from the two people looking like Lily and James. Anxiously she watched, how they stood across from each other, looking at one another for a long time. Finally Harry hesitantly made the first move towards the woman.

"Mum?" he whispered, trying the taste of the word carefully.

Lily nodded, with tears in her eyes, glancing at James with a very emotional smile for a second. Harry followed her gaze and looked now into the face that looked so similar to his own, except for the eyes.

James looked just as overwhelmed and uncertain as Harry felt. Not certain whether he should give in to the urge to hug his son, he made an awkward step forward, but then only put out his hand for Harry to shake. Harry took it and smiled, just as James chose to hug him after all, pulling Harry to himself, his whole body tingling warmly with happiness. Lily joined in with joyful tears in her eyes and the family held each other for a long time without saying a word.

Only when nothing disastrous happened after a few seconds – no explosion, Harry not disappearing, or any other catastrophe, did Molly exhale the breath she hadn't even realized she was holding. Unable to believe that it was possible that Harry was hugging his parents, she couldn't turn her eyes away from the sight. Just when she noticed the two children standing next to Harry and his parents, who were visibly touched but not certain what to do with themselves, Molly felt a hand on her shoulder. Reluctantly she turned to see Sirius looking at her sympathetically.

"I know all this is really hard to believe. Why don't we give Harry and his parents some time to catch up? I'll go back to the Burrow with you and explain everything."

Molly nodded automatically and let herself be led into the kitchen by Sirius with Hermione and Ron following them.

Harry and his parents broke the hug. Looking around in the hallway they were surprised to find only Amy and Leo standing there. Everyone else was gone. At her parents inquiring look, Amy shrugged and said, "Sirius took them somewhere to explain everything. I didn't understand where."

"Probably back to the Burrow," said Harry quietly. With shame he remembered, how he had talked to his sister only half an hour before.

"Yes, exactly. That was what he'd said." Leo grinned at his brother; apparently he had put the less than warm welcome already out of his mind. "He said he wanted to leave you alone with us. To give us all the chance to get to know each other."

Harry felt gratefulness and annoyance at Sirius at the same time. How can he do this to me? Leaving me alone with them like this? I am their son and brother and I don't know anything about them. What should I talk about with them? Looking at his situation like this, Harry felt slightly panicking.

"Harry, you probably know this place better than we," broke Lily his train of thought. "Why don't you show Amy and Leo around a bit, while we get ourselves dressed. We can have some tea and talk a little after that."

The strangest feeling of happiness settled within Harry. His mother was talking to him, totally normal stuff, which any mother could tell any child. He nodded, unable to say anything, his eyes shining brightly.

His parents had long disappeared in the bedroom, they had chosen for the night, when Harry was still standing at the foot of the stairs, staring up towards the first floor of the house.

"Er... Harry?" The careful voice of his sister broke through his thoughts. His sister! He had never even dreamt of the possibility of having a sister and a brother. Ron and Hermione had been the closest thing to siblings he had ever got to. Even with their friendship and the love he had received from all of the Weasleys, he had always felt being on his own. Now he suddenly belonged to a family of five. It was kind of hard to grasp. Slowly he shook his head and turned towards the twins.

"So, er... I'm sorry about before. You know, it was so hard to believe to have Mum and Dad back. I didn't want to get my hopes up..." Harry tried to apologize, but he had the feeling that it sounded a bit lame.

"Oh Harry, really. It's no problem," waved Amy his apology away cheerfully.

"Yeah, I can't even imagine, how I would feel in a situation like that. We are just happy to get to know you," added Leo, grinning broadly at his older brother.

Harry nodded, smiling at the enthusiasm of the two teenagers before him. "I think, I didn't catch your names before," Harry admitted, reddening slightly in embarrassment.

"I'm Leo. And that is my sister Amy." The twins stuck out their hand in mock formality. "And now that that is settled, we would like a tour of the house."

Chuckling, Harry led the way up the stairs. He was relieved that the boy and the girl made him feel so much at ease. In the last hour, Harry had felt so many different emotions that it was hard for him to analyse every single one, but one of them was the fear of the awkwardness of suddenly being a new member in a settled family, adapting to their structures. He was bound to make mistakes. But the easy-going nature of the twins took a large part of this fear away.

"Harry, what are those?" Amy had noticed the shrunken heads of what-ever-creature, when they had come down the stairs for breakfast.

Harry turned around. "Oh, that have been house-elves," disgusted with the Black-tradition of putting their heads up for decoration after their death.

"What are house-elves?" wanted Leo to know now and Harry launched into explanation of the extremely loyal, hard-working, sometimes annoying servants of rich wizarding families. He told them the story of Dobby and promised them, that they would meet the elf, Harry had freed when he had been in second year in Hogwarts.

They had nearly finished their tour through the house and were on their way back to the kitchen, when Leo suddenly slammed his hand to his forehead. Harry spun around startled, because it was the same movement he made, when Voldemort sent him pain through his scar.

"What is it?" he asked concerned.

"Oh, I just remembered. I know, it's already been a week, but still: Happy birthday, Harry," said Leo, grinning happily at her brother, sticking out his hand to him.

Harry took it, shaking his head in exasperation at himself, and grinning at his siblings. "So how old are you?" he asked Leo and Amy.

"We turned fourteen yesterday," replied Amy.

"Happy birthday to you too then," Harry congratulated, smiling.

"Thanks. Well, Mum and Dad sure knew how to make use of those cold and dark November nights, didn't they?" Leo said deadpan.

Harry stared at the innocently smiling face of his younger brother, before he burst out laughing.

"I'm sure Fred and George Weasley would love to meet you," he said when he had calmed down enough to talk again.

"Oh, we would love to meet them," cried Amy, her eyes shining happily.

"On the other hand, maybe it is safer for the wizarding world, if you didn't meet them," he pondered to the laughter of his brother and sister.

"Harry, I see you have met your siblings," said a familiar voice behind him.

"Hi Remus," Harry greeted, turning around to the man, who had until this morning been the last Marauder in the wizarding world. "Yes, I did. And I think I like them," he added with a playfully glancing Leo and Amy up and down.

Remus nodded, smiling and also greeted the twins. "Your parents are in the living room. They are waiting for you."

"Thanks. Are you coming downstairs too?" Harry asked.

"Later. Tonks and I'll join Sirius at the Burrow, I guess we'll invite everyone over here for dinner tonight, though."

"Okay, see you then." The three teens waved and Leo and Amy rushed down the stairs, Harry following them.

Some minutes later, Lily, James, Harry, Amy and Leo had settled in a half circle around the fire place of the living room, each having a steaming cup of tea in their hands. On a small couch table between the sofa, Lily and James were sitting on and Harry's armchair stood a plate with a mountain of sandwiches.

They were sitting in silence for a long time. Harry felt as if his senses were heightened to the extreme. He could perceive every single detail of his surroundings with an unusual intensity. The warm porcelain of the mug under his fingers, the crackling of the fire in front of him, the soft rippling of the waves in his tea when he was blowing it cooler, the calm breathing of his parents and brother and sister – his family. With a content sigh, Harry leaned back in the chair and let his gaze go around the room. He had spent the last half hour with his brother and sister. But hadn't really had the opportunity to look at them. Leo was slightly taller than him, with sleek auburn hair and dark forest green eyes. His face looked very similar to the one his mother – their mother, Harry realized with a smile.

His sister Amy had the typical black, wild Potter-hair, even though it looked more manageable and even pretty, as it flowed in long waved around her shoulders. When the light of the fire hit it in certain angles it had a red sheen to it. When Amy felt the gaze of her brother on her, she turned and grinned broadly at him, her hazel eyes sparkling. Harry couldn't help but grin back at this contagious and slightly mischievous smile. He remembered Hermione noticing that it was the same smile, he usually had and felt his own grin widening at the thought.

His dad – the spitting image of himself. People had always told him how similar he looked to his father. But to see it with his own eyes. The slim and not quite tall man, sitting next to him had the same unruly and raven black hair he saw every morning when he looked into the mirror. Even though Harry could make out a few single silver hairs between all the black. With a pang of sadness it came to him that even though he had finally met his family now after fifteen years, against all odds and expectations, he still hadn't had them during his childhood, when he had most needed them. With this realization a burning rage against Voldemort ran through him. He had taken the opportunity to grow up among those wonderful people, people who loved him, people who are his family. Voldemort would pay.

Harry swallowed with difficulty. He didn't want to think of the dark wizard now. All he wanted was to enjoy the reunification with his family and that would not be spoilt by such dark thoughts.

Harry turned around towards his mother and his own brilliant green eyes were looking back at him, eyes full of love and pride. When he was looking at her, he felt as if he was special and for the first time in his life he didn't feel embarrassed or angry for it. He didn't know how long he had looked at Lily, when she spoke up softly.

"I saw you in my dreams."

Harry nodded, a lump building in his throat. He had dreamt of his parents as well, not as often as he would have liked to, but they were his favourite dreams. They always had him feeling a sad contentedness after he woke up.

"Most of the time, I just saw you sleeping," his mother went on. "But I also watched Albus leaving you at my sister and Hagrid giving you your Hogwarts letter. Countless times I saw, how you were wandering the corridors at night," she said with a tone somewhere between chiding and fondly. Then she swallowed hard. "But I also witnessed your encounter with Quirrell and Voldemort, your fight with the Basilisk and the night when you cast a Patronus against hundred of Dementors," she whispered in a voice choked with fear.

With a jolt Harry realized that Lily's dreams had been more than just that. They had been similar to the visions he had had due to his connection to Voldemort. He stared at his mother.

"You saw everything, that I did during the nights?" he asked dumbfounded, not knowing what to think about his mother's revelation, then he looked inquiringly at his father.

James shook his head, a slight grin on his face. He knew what he would have been worried about, if he had been told something like this, when he was Harry's age. "No, I was there only once. At this graveyard, two years ago, your mother and I were coming out of Voldemorts wand to help you."

Harry's chin nearly hit the floor, so astonished was he. "You… so that was really … I always thought that had only been images… I don't know … well, thank you I guess. You saved my life there. Again," he added in a whisper, charged with emotions.

James and Lily were smiling at him sadly, while Amy and Leo were looking at their parents and their brother curiously. Although Lily and James had talked much about the wizarding world and about Harry, they had never said anything about saving Harry at a graveyard.

The next hours passed with Harry, James and Lily mainly talking about what had happened in each of the worlds they had been living in and about the few times when both of these dimensions had been so close to each other that they had influenced one another. The twins were sitting quietly most of the time and listening raptly to all those fantastic and enthralling stories, their parents and brother were exchanging.

Sirius held out his hand to help Molly keep her balance as she stumbled out of the fireplace in the Burrow. She thanked his with a small, shaky smile. Ron and Hermione were already there. They had gone first to prepare anyone who was potentially sitting in the kitchen not to be scared by Sirius appearing in the fireplace. The room was empty, though and so Hermione and Ron were waiting eagerly for Molly and Sirius to come through.

Being aware that Molly wasn't in the right state to be a good host right now, Sirius asked Ron to make tea for all of them.

"Molly, who is staying here at the Burrow right now?" Sirius asked gently.

"Er... it's only family now. Everyone left after the wedding," she answered automatically, staring at Sirius as if she was still wondering whether she was really talking to him or whether she was imagining it.

"Wedding?"

"Yes, Bill and Fleur Delacour married yesterday," Hermione informed him.

"Oh, that's wonderful Molly. Congratulations," he smiled friendly at Molly and she returned it somewhat less insecurely. Sirius then cleared his throat and said, "Well I suggest that everyone meets here, so I have to tell the story only once."

Ron offered to floo the twins and get them here to listen to Sirius' story as well.

Five minutes later Arthur, Bill, Fleur, Charlie and Ginny, Fred and George had joined Molly, Sirius, Ron and Hermione in the kitchen. Fred and George had already returned to their flat in Diagon Alley, but would be back for dinner.

After having proved his identity to every one present, by transforming into a big black dog, Sirius launched right into his story of what had happened to him after he had fallen through the Veil in the battle at the Ministry.

What Sirius was telling them was almost impossible to believe for all of them and especially Bill and Hermione were extremely interested in the Veil of Death and Bill was asking him countless questions on details of the gateway and of the tunnel in the London Underground of the other world. Sirius gave his best to answer all his questions, but between his own not-knowing and the impatience of the other Weasleys to get back to the _important_ parts of his story, Sirius promised Bill that he could ask James and Lily later, and that they surely knew more about it.

Sometime during his relation of the last year's events, Remus and Tonks joined them in the kitchen of the Burrow and Sirius was grateful to have a short break during which Remus was pestered with their questions on how James, Lily and the twins were.

During the nearly two hours it took Sirius to tell everything that happened during the last months, his listeners had become more and more used to the idea of James, Lily and him really returning from this other world. Soon Sirius wasn't the one who did most of the talking anymore, but a lively, excited discussion had developed. Everyone was especially looking forward to meeting Harry's family. Remus had told them, that he wanted to give the Potters time to catch up and they all had agreed that they would floo over no earlier than seven o'clock. At five minutes to seven, all thirteen witches and wizards lined up in front of the fire place in the Weasley's kitchen and one after the other stepped through, saying "Grimmauld Place" loudly and clearly.


	20. Hunting Plans

**Chapter 20 – Hunting Plans**

Harry had a hard time falling asleep that night; and his messed up day-and-night rhythm after the celebrating through the night at Bill's and Fleur's wedding wasn't the only reason for that. Too many thoughts, emotions and memories were causing a turmoil in his head. Had it only been ten hours ago that he had learned of his family returning to his world? That he had learned of having a younger brother and sister?

Were it not for the book, Amy and Leo had brought from the other world, lying on his night stand, Harry probably wouldn't be sure whether he had dreamt everything that had happened today. Before turning off the light he had leafed through the pages of the slightly tattered book and imagined how it must have been for the twins to read about their brother's life and the wizarding world, as if everything that had happened to him during his first year at Hogwarts wasn't more than a fairy tale.

Harry smiled at the thought of his brother and sister. He was really looking forward to get to know them better. He had been right about one thing: Amy and Leo did like Fred and George Weasley. During dinner Harry had introduced the two sets of twins to each other and for the whole evening the four of them had been sitting together, talking, laughing and maybe plotting – Harry didn't even want to know.

Harry himself had used the chance to catch up all the lost time with Sirius. When he had seen his godfather standing in the hall of Grimmauld Place this afternoon, silencing the portrait of Mrs. Black, Harry had at first thought that he was hallucinating. Talking with Sirius during dinner had been totally different than getting to know his parents and siblings earlier that day. Not that he hadn't been incredibly happy about the chance to have a family now, but being together with Sirius had been so much easier and much more fun than the emotionally ladden and sometimes tense conversation the Potter family had had before everyone else had arrived. With Sirius Harry had already common memories to be shared; and before Sirius' "death" the two of them had developed something, which Harry sometimes caught himself thinking of as a father-son relationship. Now that his own family was back, Harry didn't know whether he should feel guilty that he was closer to Sirius than he was to them. He shook his head confusedly. Maybe he should give himself more time to get to know everyone.

With a smile he remembered how everyone had enjoyed himself or herself this evening. Molly and Remus had thrown a simple but delicious dinner together for everybody. He had seen that his father had talked with Ron and Hermione for a long time. From what Harry had heard, James had talked a lot about his experience of teaching physics and P.E. in a muggle school – no wonder about the subject of conversation when Hermione was around, but the two teenagers had also shared their memories of the Golden Trio's adventures with Harry's father. His mother had looked like being pestered with questions about the Veil and her dreams by Bill, with Remus and Ginny listening to their conversation. Bill was working as a curse breaker for Gringotts, and even though Harry didn't know so much about the oldest Weasley brother, he knew that he had a weakness for unsolved mysteries.

They had parted late in the evening in the agreement that they would keep the arrival of Harry's family and Sirius quiet for now and that Hermione and Ron would come over to Grimmauld Place again in the morning. Later, when Arthur and the older Weasley brothers came home from work, they and Molly and Ginny would join them and all of them would start making plans on what to do now. The five Potters, Sirius, Remus and Tonks stayed at the old Black family home, where Harry was now lying in bed, letting the day pass before his mind's eye before finally falling asleep with a happy sigh.

When Harry walked into the kitchen the next morning for breakfast he saw that he wasn't the first one up, even though it was still quite early.

Lily was sitting at the table, having a steaming cup of tea in front of her. Amy and Leo were bouncing up and down in front of her, begging their mother to finally show them how to do magic.

Harry stood in the door for a few moments, watching them in content amusement before his mother noticed him.

"Good morning, Harry." She smiled and beckoned him to join them at the table.

Before he had even reached the chair his brother and sister had surrounded him.

"Harry, you can show us this cool flash-light spell, can't you?" Amy asked him excitedly.

Harry laughed and poured himself some tea. "Sure, I can. After breakfast."

While he was eating, Harry and Lily talked about Harry's friends and especially the Weasleys. Lily had known Molly and Arthur from when they had been in the Order of the Phoenix during the first war against Voldemort. When Harry was born, Molly had often given Lily advice on how to deal with a small child. Now Lily was grateful that the Weasleys had welcomed Harry in their family with open arms, while she and James had been absent.

Lily had been surprised to see the band of red-haired children, who had crawled all over headquarters sixteen years ago, all grown up. But on the other hand, Harry had grown up as well. So much had changed while they had been gone.

True to his word, Harry got up from the table as soon as his plate was empty. "So, you mean the Lumos-charm, right?" Harry asked the twins in reference to his promise to teach them some magic.

"Yes, exactly. That's what Dad said, when he lit up his finger," said Leo.

Harry raised his eyebrow in respect. He knew how hard it was to control wandless magic; in fact he had never managed to do it intentionally. He had only done it when he was in desperate situations. He made a mental note to ask his father later whether he could help him to use his magic in this way.

Lily left the three siblings to their lesson with a proud smile and went to see whether Sirius and Remus were already awake and whether the shower had more success in waking James up, than she. In half an hour they expected Ron and Hermione to come over and it would not be nice to have the men still walk around in pyjamas.

"Well, I won't teach you to light up your finger," Harry told his brother and sister. "It is very hard to do magic without a wand. You don't have your own wands yet, so you can practice with mine." Seeing their impatient and excited faces, Harry smiled.

"Okay Amy, ladies first." Harry handed Amy his wand and showed her how to hold it correctly. "Now, as you already know, the Lumos-charm causes light. For it to work you need to wish for light at the same time as saying the word 'lumos'," Harry explained.

Amy nodded and fastened her hand around the wand. Wishing very hard for a bright spot of light to show up at the point of the wand, she said the incantation.

Nothing happened.

"Try it again," said Harry encouragingly. "It hardly ever works at the first try."

Amy tried at least a dozen times more without success and then gave the wand to Leo, whose results were not much better than his sister's.

"What are we doing wrong?" he asked almost desperately after another ten minutes of unresulting wand-waving.

"It takes some practice. You really have to imagine yourself causing the light. You give your own energy to accomplish it."

Leo and Amy nodded, though they looked somewhat doubtful and Harry smiled encouragingly at his brother and sister.

"It is really hard with a wand that is not your own. Why don't we leave it for now? All the others will be here anyway in a minute. Maybe we can buy wands for you sometime in the next days."

The twins were not happy about abandoning their magical practice, but at that moment the fireplace came to life and a moment later Hermione stepped out of it, Ron following shortly after her.

Ten minutes later, the whole Potter family, Sirius, Remus, Ron and Hermione gathered noisily around the large kitchen table. Lily was putting a large plate of crumpets on the table, Sirius following her, carrying a beaker of ice-cold pumpkin juice.

"So, now what's the plan?" he asked, as he let himself fall into a chair between Remus and Leo.

"I don't know," said Lily as she sat down next to James. "Maybe we should let Albus know that we are back and invite him to join us in the evening, when we meet again with all the others."

While James and Sirius nodded at her suggestion, Harry visibly paled and Ron and Hermione glanced at him and at each other in concern, while Remus had his eyes narrowed in anger and pain.

Noticing the unexpected reaction to Lily's proposal, James and Sirius looked around in confusion. When no explanation came forward, Leo ignorantly piped up in defence of his mother, "Why not? In the book Professor Dumbledore seemed like someone, who knows just about everything. He could sure help us now."

Harry closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair. Yes, his brother was right. Dumbledore would know for sure what the right thing to do next would be. The only problem was that he had been killed not even ten weeks ago – murdered by a man, whom he had trusted, even though he was a Death Eater.

"Lily, Albus is dead," whispered Remus in a voice, raw with emotion.

There was a shocked silence on the side of the table where the Potters and Sirius were sitting. It was not fair. Sure, they all had known that time had passed in the wizarding world, while James, Lily and Sirius had been away, but it had never come to their mind that people might have died in the mean time.

"How?" asked Lily, and didn't need to explain what she meant.

"Snape." There was a hate in Remus's voice as James and Sirius had never heard from the normally so self-controlled werewolf before. "The killing curse."

"But…why? I mean, Snape is a bloody git, but Albus trusted him, didn't he? Maybe they only made it look like it, and Albus went into hiding," rambled Sirius helplessly.

Harry shook his head automatically. "No," he said flatly. "I was there. He killed him right in front of my eyes. Professor Dumbledore was weak from a potion he had drunken before and asked me to call Snape, so that he could heal him. I didn't get far. Malfoy got in the way and Professor Dumbledore put a full body-bind on me to keep me from interfering…"

Harry told his parents, Sirius and the twins the whole story of looking for the Horcrux in the cave, returning to the castle and finding the Dark Mark over the Astronomy Tower, and finally the almost successful attempt of Dumbledore to talk some conscience into Malfoy so that he wouldn't kill him, only to have Snape coming to the tower a minute later and finishing Malfoys job.

"…no, it wasn't just to fool Voldemort. Snape really killed him," Harry finished his relation to the events of this fateful night in May.

Heavy silence fell on the kitchen. All of them had wanted to speak about the war against Voldemort, had wanted to exchange information and news on what had happened during the time when they hadn't been together. But talking about Dumbledore's death had brought their dire situation home again. Dumbledore had been the one to lead the resistance against Voldemort. He had been the one with knowledge on almost all branches of magic, with insights into the ministry and with a whole life of experiences and wisdom. What was the Order of the Phoenix supposed to do without him?

There had been an Order meeting two weeks after Dumbledore's death, but it had soon become clear that the old wizard had been the one to hold all those people with their different backgrounds, experiences and opinions together. Without him there seemed to be too many arguments to do anything productive. Also fear and mistrust were always present after Snape had turned out to be a Death Eater after all. The Order threatened to fall apart.

Remus shook his head. The return of James, Lily and Sirius had made him forget how much Snape and Voldemort had hurt the Order with taking Dumbledore away.

A sudden idea made him look up and gaze thoughtfully at his friends, who he had believed lost for such a long time.

"Isn't there hope that Dumbledore meets this author, Mrs. Rowling, as well? Maybe he finds the way back into our world too."

While everyone else at the table looked intrigued and hopeful at once, Lily shook her head sadly.

"I don't think that he will come back. You remember that we arrived in this other world exactly in the same state, we were in when we left the wizarding world. We kept on aging there, we could hurt ourselves and people died in this world as well. Dumbledore is 148 years old now. How could a man in his age survive in a world where no magic exists? I'm sure he died in this other dimension, if he had ever reached it, and moved on to whatever comes next."

Sirius nodded hesitantly. "Even if it wasn't his age. Harry, you said that Dumbledore was weakened from the potion he had drunken in the cave. If that stuff was poisoning him and only a potion could have saved him, then he would have died in a world without magic anyway, because potions are magic."

It felt almost as if they had lost Albus Dumbledore for a second time, when they realized that there was no hope of him ever coming back. For a long time nobody knew what to say.

Finally James cleared his throat. "So, it looks like we are on our own now against Voldemort." He stated the obvious, feeling helpless. He looked at Lily and his children. There had never been a question whether he should go back to the wizarding world, to help Harry in the fight against Voldemort; and he didn't regret coming here. But only now the danger he had brought the rest of his family into, sank in.

Lily returned his look reproachfully. She could guess what her husband was thinking, and even though she wasn't happy with the danger, the situation brought for her children, she didn't want James to blame himself for a decision all of them had made together.

To put James off from his train of thought, Lily turned towards her eldest son. "Harry, I was wondering. When we first met you yesterday, you were being shouted at by Molly. What was that about?"

Startled by the sudden turn of the conversation, Harry looked up at his mother. When her question had finally registered with him, he blushed and searched Ron and Hermione with his eyes, asking them for help. When they didn't say anything, he sighed and answered his mother.

"Er, … I told you about the trip to the cave, where Professor Dumbledore and I were looking for the Horcrux. Well, I already told you that it wasn't there anymore and we only found a letter instead." Harry was looking at Sirius now. "The letter was signed with R.A.B." He was now watching his godfather closely, waiting for his reaction.

Sirius frowned, while all the other adults and the twins had blank looks on their faces.

"And what was written in the letter?" Sirius asked slowly.

Harry carefully pulled an old and crumpled piece of parchment out of his robe pocket and showed it to his godfather.

He put it on the tabletop in front of him to read it, and James and Remus curiously leaned forward to see what was written in the letter as well.

The frown on Sirius's forehead deepened and when he had finished the letter, he looked at his godson, his eyes wide with astonishment.

James and Remus, as well as Lily and the twins, who hadn't read the letter, were now completely puzzled.

"So what has all of this to do with Molly telling you off for coming to Grimmauld Place without you telling her?" Lily asked Harry impatiently.

Sirius spoke before Harry had the chance to answer. "Do you all remember Regulus, my brother, who became a Death Eater and then was murdered by one of his fellow Death Eaters, without any of us ever knowing why?"

Remus, Lily and James nodded, having no clue were this was going.

"Well, apparently Voldemort had a very good reason for killing him, even though he probably didn't even know it."

James rolled his eyes. "Padfoot, could you please tell us already what all of this is about?" he asked with a pained sigh.

Ron couldn't help but throw a grin at Harry, while pointing at Hermione with his eyes.

Sirius cleared his throat dramatically and set up straight. He had never thought that he would feel proud of his brother, but stealing a Horcrux, a seventh part of Voldemort's soul, was something that raised his respect for his little brother.

"Regulus Antares Black went through the cave, probably sometime in the beginning of 1980 and managed to take the Locket away, which Voldemort had turned into a Horcrux," he announced proudly.

"Looks like Harry found out that this letter was written by Regulus and was searching for a hint here about where my brother might have hidden the Locket, am I right?" Sirius grinned at his godson.

"Actually Hermione found out about Regulus, but yes, we wanted to find out something about Regulus so I called Kreacher, to see whether he knew anything. But when he didn't react, we decided to come here and look for him." Harry mentioned Kreacher's name with barely hidden distaste.

"Of course!" Hermione cried out. "Kreacher didn't react, because you are not his master anymore, Harry. Now that Sirius is back, Kreacher doesn't need to listen to you anymore!" she exclaimed, apparently excited that she had figured it out.

Harry shrugged. Now that Sirius was here, he didn't need Kreacher for information and he couldn't care less about the house-elf. "So, have you ever seen the Locket? Have you noticed anything of Regulus having hidden it here in the house?" Harry asked his godfather.

Sirius shook his head. "But I'm sure that we can find either the Locket or a hint on where Regulus has hidden it, in the house," he said enthusiastically of finally being able to carry out a task which actually helped in bringing down Voldemort.

A/N: Hi, I'm really proud of myself to be punctual this time :-) Hope you liked it. (If you liked it, tell me. If not, tell me anyway)


	21. Godric's Hollow

A/N: Hi, sorry for the delay. Real life was so busy that the story had to wait. I hope it was at least worth waiting for the chapter :-) Enjoy.

**Chapter 21 – Godric's Hollow**

The better part of the following days passed in searching the Noble and most Ancient House of Black for any sign of the silver locket, which Voldemort had turned into a Horcrux.

James, Lily, Sirius, Harry and the twins were basically turning their current place of residence upside down. Every day Ron and Hermione joined them to help searching as well; and as often as their work schedules allowed it, some of the other Weasleys would also come over. All the while Remus was trying to get a hold of Mundungus Fletcher. The small-time criminal had nicked quite an amount of valuable items from Sirius's house, when the last Black heir had been believed dead. If the Locket was among the stolen goods, it was of importance to question Mundungus about it as soon as possible, before it changed its owner too often and they totally lost track of the Horcrux.

Almost a week had gone by with always the same routine of Ron and Hermione flooing over from the Burrow before breakfast and helping everyone, who was at Grimmauld Place at that time, searching through masses of dusty boxes, cupboards and dressers.

After dinner the Potters, Weasleys and their friends usually gathered in the sitting room, telling stories from their past in their respective worlds, playing card games or chess. James, Leo and Amy were also practicing their Tae Kwon Do skills for one hour each evening in the former drawing room of the old town house. The first time they did so, Harry, Ron and Hermione were watching, but especially Ron was so fascinated by this way of fighting that he joined in their practices from the next evening on.

Although Harry couldn't claim that he didn't enjoy the busy but peaceful routine, spending the time with people he deeply cared for; and at the same time finally having started his Horcrux hunt, he felt that their effort was neither very effective nor efficient.

Compared to the force and brutality with which Voldemort was now showing the world that he was back, almost a dozen of his fiercest opponents spending their time exclusively on searching a trinket, which might even be destroyed already, just seemed a fatal wastefulness.

Soon Harry realized that he thankfully wasn't the only one feeling restless. His parents and Sirius apparently weren't completely satisfied with their lack of success either.

"Blasted box!" cursed Sirius when a long wooden splinter embedded itself in his finger while he was trying to force the lid of a large crate open. "This would be a lot easier, if we at least had our wands," he added with a frustrated sigh, as he let himself collapse against the wall next to Harry and Leo.

The three of them had sorted through mountains of rubbish in the attic for the last two hours.

"Yeah, I want my own wand too. Maybe then I can finally do that Lumos-spell," agreed Leo wistfully.

Leo and Amy were still eager to finally learn some magic and Harry was patiently supporting them, even though they still hadn't managed to get as much as a spark out of his wand. The twins were quite upset about their lack of success but didn't even think of giving up, while Harry secretly feared that Amy and Leo might not have any magic in them, being born into a Muggle world.

Leo leaned his head back against the wall. He had expected his new life in a world full of magic to be more exciting than emptying never-ending masses of dusty boxes.

"How long are we actually supposed to stay inside?" he asked listlessly while Harry pulled the splinter out of Sirius's hand with a wave of his wand.

Harry shrugged. "I don't know. When we all agreed to keep your presence secret it was easy to say, we are all staying here in the house and search for a hint of Regulus's hiding place for the locket. But I guess it turns out that this isn't exactly the ideal course of action, is it?"

Leo shook his head vigorously. "No, definitely not."

Sirius chuckled and stood up. "Well, I think it is time to do some proper planning for letting the Marauders run loose again. We'll talk about it over dinner. For now let's finish those remaining four boxes back there."

That night at dinner everyone, who knew of Harry's family being alive, was present. Harry was sitting between Amy and Ron, with Leo and Hermione sitting across from them. Leo was excitedly telling his sister that they might be leaving the house soon, and finally see some more of the magical world than the interior of this gloomy house.

Ginny sat between her father and Charlie, shooting sad glances at Harry every now and then. The two of them had avoided each other ever since Harry had broken up with her, and although they had promised to stay friends, it was obvious that they behaved very awkwardly around each other.

Sirius was sitting next to James at the other end of the table, waiting anxiously for Molly to finally sit down so that he could propose the idea of going out.

"We literally took apart Grimmauld Place and came up with nothing," he said when everyone had started eating. "We should start thinking about the next steps we want to take."

"I finally found Mundungus. He said he has never seen the locket. He can't remember it being among the things he 'has taken care of' during your absence, Sirius," Remus piped up, his resentment of Fletcher apparent in his voice.

"Yeah, I thought so." Sirius sighed. "Anyway, I thought the first thing we should do, was getting a wand for Prongs, Lily and myself – and for the kids of course," he added when he saw Leo open his mouth, about to draw attention to the fact that he and his sister needed wands too.

Mrs Weasley creased her forehead in worry, but didn't say anything. She had known that sooner or later Sirius and the Potters would want to be more active in the fight against Voldemort. She remembered how she had once argued with Ron about him, Hermione and Harry constantly getting in danger. Ron had answered, "Mum, if you don't use your queen, your enemy will capture it anyway." Molly hadn't liked it, but in a way her son was right. As long as Voldemort was around, all of them were in danger, whether they were fighting or hiding.

"We need to go looking for a good wand maker, since Mr. Ollivander has disappeared from Diagon Alley." Mrs. Weasley took part in the discussion, determined to prevent any rash action by planning everything carefully.

"Lily, didn't old Mr. Hyalin also make wands? I know he was making staffs," said James thoughtfully.

"Yes, he was specialising on staffs, but he is a certified wand maker." At the blank looks of all the others she added, "Mr. Hyalin lived a few blocks away from us in Godric's Hollow, but he was already very old when we lived there, so we need to check out whether he is still there."

"I can do that tomorrow at work," offered Mr. Weasley.

When on the next day Mr. Weasley had confirmed that Hyalin's Finest Staffs was still in business in Godric's Hollow, it was decided that they would make a trip to the village on the following Saturday.

Considering the fact that James and Lily were believed dead and hadn't been around for one and a half decade, the risk of anyone recognizing them was small. But as to not take chances they would travel in two groups: Lily, James and the twins, taking Padfoot along as dog would floo straight to the wand maker, while Harry, Hermione and Ron would first go to Gringotts together with Remus and Tonks to get the money for the wands. Ginny had pondered for quite some time, whether she wanted to join them, but in the end she preferred to stay home with her parents. Around noon the two groups would meet at Mr. Hyalin's shop. This way hopefully nobody would be making a connection between Harry and his parents.

As a further precaution, Fred and George were providing Barber Balls for Lily and James to change the colour of their hair, as even for wizards it was hard to change their appearance without help, if they weren't Metamorphmagi.

"They are a side product of our Hairy-Rainbow line," said George proudly.

"In comparison to the Green Hair-Monster or the Pink Shocker, the Barber Balls are dead boring," continued Fred in the Weasley twins' trademark of taking turns with speaking.

"But I guess they will be pretty useful in our case," explained George proficiently.

"One single ball will instantly change the colour of your hair into strawberry-blond, light brown, chestnut or black for six hours," finished Fred in the manner of a salesman.

Two days later on Saturday morning, James, Lily and their two younger children were standing in front of the fireplace in the kitchen of the Black's town house.

Harry, his two friends, Remus and Tonks had already left the house for Diagon Alley, as the security measures at Gringotts hadn't been loosened since last summer and they had to count on standing in line for quite a long time.

Leo and Amy had watched them vanish in the fireplace in fascination, fully knowing that their own first travel by Floo powder was only a few minutes away.

"Okay, travelling by Floo powder is not difficult, although it takes some getting used to it," explained Lily, now black-haired, to Leo and Amy. "You have to throw the powder in the fireplace, step into the flames and say loud and clearly _Godric's Hollow_."

The twins nodded, looking excited and apprehensive at the same time.

James smiled at his children. He looked strange with his now light brown hair. "Don't worry. As soon as you throw the powder into the flames, they will not be hot anymore. But I recommend that you close your eyes against the sooth and ashes." With another wink at the twins he stepped towards the fireplace, where Sirius was waiting for him. "Sirius and I go first, then you come after us and Mum will come through last, okay?"

The two men were swallowed by the green flames and Leo and Amy looked at each other nervously.

With slight trepidation Leo grabbed a handful of the sandy powder, cast a last look at his sister and mother, and threw the Floo powder into the fireplace.

His father had been right with his recommendation to close one's eyes while travelling from one chimney to the next. As soon as Leo had spoken his destination, he was rapidly spun around in a whirl of bright colours and sooth. Quickly he screwed up his eyes and hugged his own body tightly, when his left elbow scraped against a rough brick wall. As fast as it had started, the spinning sensation stopped abruptly and Leo failed to keep his balance, falling out of another fireplace, landing inelegantly in front of Sirius's and James's feet.

As Sirius needed a new wand as well, he didn't transform into a dog yet. He would do so after they had left the shop.

James helped his son to his feet with a smile and while Leo was still struggling to catch his breath, Amy and Lily had already come through, Amy looking just as ruffled as Leo felt.

"Where are we?" asked Leo, looking around in the small and plain room, which was empty apart from the fireplace they had emerged from. Across the room there was an old wooden door with some words carved into it, but time had made the carvings illegible.

"It's the public fireplace of Hyalin's shop," said James.

The room adjacent to the arrival chamber was a large dusty and dim workshop. Material needed for wand making lay scattered on worn tables. In a corner there stood several wooden sticks, each of them at least one and a half meters long, waiting to be processed to staffs or wands.

On the far end of the room an old man stood stooped over a work table, his back to the visitors, and was sorting through a bundle of very fine silvery threads in the bright sunlight, which was seeping through a small round window above his head. Apparently he hadn't heard them enter.

"Good morning," said James loudly.

The man slowly put the bundle down; Lily guessed that it was probably unicorn hair; and turned around to his customers with some effort, squinting at them.

Amy had to bite back a gasp. She had never seen such an old man before. His very small face was framed with long strands of thin white hair and his parched skin had so many deep wrinkles that it was not easy to make out his features on the first glance. His lips had lost all colour and small dark eyes, which were hidden deeply in their hollows, stared alertly and intensively at the five people in front of him.

"Good morning," he rasped with a voice that sounded like sandpaper. "Who of you needs a wand? You?" He pointed a long filigree finger at Leo and Amy, who nodded timidly.

"Well, actually all of us need one," said Amy after swallowing nervously.

The old man, who was obviously Mr. Hyalin shook his head. "You have to speak louder, girl. My ears aren't the best anymore," he said with a crooked smile.

"All five of us need a new wand," she repeated much louder this time.

An excited, almost boyish grin appeared on his old face as he slowly hobbled towards his visitors. "Five wands," he mumbled. "Maybe a nice staff for the young lady," he said, looking at Lily. "You're powerful enough to use one."

Lily shook her head, smiling. "No, a wand is just fine for me."

Mr. Hyalin's gaze snapped back to Amy and Leo once more, scrutinizing them for a long minute, before turning back to the adults. "Let's fit you for your wands first," he told Sirius and bade him over to his worktable.

During the next two minutes Mr. Hyalin did nothing, but stare intensively at the younger wizard in front of him, making Sirius feel unusually self-conscious. Finally the old man was finished with whatever he was doing and gave Sirius a satisfied grin.

"Now, let's see. Twelve inch, hazel, core of dragon heart string." He walked back into another room, probably his storeroom and came back a minute later, holding a long and narrow box right under Sirius's nose. Sirius took the wand out of it and immediately felt how a wave of warm tingling rushed through his body, the wand in his hand emitting a few sparks.

"Wow!" He stared at Mr. Hyalin in astonishment. "Right in one. Mr. Ollivander took more than half an hour to find the right wand for me."

Hyalin chuckled lowly. "Yes, Ollivander really makes the best wands, but he has no clue about fitting a wand to its user. Okay, who is next?"

Lily came forward and stood opposite Mr. Hyalin, letting him assess her for a fitting wand – eleven inches willow with a core of phoenix feather. When she was finished, James got his wand of twelve inches mahogany wood, with a core of dragon heartstring, just as Sirius had.

In the middle of James having his wand found, the door to Mr. Hyalin's workshop opened and Remus entered, carrying a leather bag, filled with golden Galleons.

"Thanks, Remus," said Sirius as he took the money from his friend. "We are almost finished here. There are only the kids left now for getting their wands."

"The children, yes." Mr. Hyalin sighed heavily. "You know that the wand is only a channel for the power of a witch or a wizard. Well, with these two children there is nothing to channel. They were born without magic."

For a minute, shocked silence lay over the dusty workroom, before Leo and Amy started protesting loudly.

"No, that can't be right. Mum and Dad are magic, and Harry is too. So we _have_ to be magic as well!" Leo cried out indignantly.

"Please, Mr. Hyalin! Maybe you have not looked right," said Amy desperately.

The adults remained silent, while the twins were dealing with this heavy blow. Although they had hoped that Leo and Amy would show signs of magic as soon as they held their own wands, it didn't come as a surprise that they didn't.

"Amy, Leo," said Lily quietly. "Let's go."


	22. Gryffin Maid

**Chapter 22 – Gryffin Maid**

„Where is he?" Voldemort asked impatiently as he strolled lazily towards the darkly clad figure kneeling on the cold floor in front of him.

"In the dungeon, my Lord," replied the Deatheater to his feet, only a slight tremor in his voice betraying his apprehension in the proximity of the Dark Lord.

"Bring him to me, then." The high-pitched voice cut sharply through the air of the large and bare stone hall, which was uncomfortably cold even though there were summerly temperatures outside.

"Yes, my Lord." Dolohov scrambled hastily to his feet and with one more sloppy and nervous bow he left his master alone.

Feeling as if malevolent eyes were watching his every move as he walked through the empty corridors, Dolohov couldn't repress a shiver. Since Voldemort had chosen this manor house to be his base of operations, the old walls themselves, once radiating a cool and distant nobility, now seemed cruel and cold. It was almost as if they had absorbed the evil of their current resident.

Dolohov shook his head as he purposefully strode onwards to fulfil the order of his master. Considering the reaction of the Dark Lord when Dolohov had told him about the little smuggler, he seemed to have landed a hit. More or less on chance he had kidnapped the man, after he had stumbled across him meeting Dumbledore's pet werewolf. Now it seemed that the Dark Lord was very interested in what the two of them might have talked about – and if he indeed does find it interesting enough, I might rise even further than Rookwood in the Dark Lord's favour, Dolohov thought with an ugly smile.

With an unnaturally loud clatter he opened the barred door to a small and dirty cell and trained his wand on the miserable heap of rags, lying in one corner.

"Get up, scum!" he sneered as he saw the man raise his head with difficulty and a pained groan. "The Dark Lord doesn't like to wait," he added roughly, kicking the man impatiently, before he grabbed his arm and hauled him to his feet.

Half dragging the prisoner, Dolohov hurried along the way he had come.

The two of them entered Voldemort's makeshift throne hall. The Dark Lord wasn't alone anymore, as Dolohov had left him, but Bellatrix Lestrange and her husband were standing at his left side now.

Dolohov shoved the prisoner hard in the back so that he fell limply at Voldemort's feet, before he himself knelt more gracefully in front of his master.

Voldemort ignored Dolohov but stared coldly and maliciously at the man, crumpled before him.

"Fletcher," he hissed softly. "How nice of you to join us. My dear friend here told me that you had a very interesting conversation with a certain werewolf."

Mundungus Fletcher stared at Him-who-must-not-be-named with barely concealed panic; his eyes unnaturally wide open as he shook his head vehemently.

"What did Lupin want?" Voldemort's voice sounded like frozen steel.

"He – I - … no." Mundungus didn't even have time to curse himself for appearing so weak and fearful, before the Crucio curse hit him.

After endless seconds of bitter agony, Voldemort lifted the curse and left Mundungus panting and trembling uncontrollably at the floor.

"Now, what did he want?"

Knowing that he wouldn't survive Voldmort's hospitality anyway, Mundungus scratched all the courage, he had left, together and looked up defiantly. "That's none of your business." He was surprised how steady his voice sounded.

Voldemort smiled cruelly at the smuggler and locked eyes with him. Mundungus realized his mistake in the same moment, when memories of his meeting with Lupin were playing out before his mind's eye like a film.

He saw how the friendly, worn-out werewolf approached him, heard how he asked him questions about the treasures he had taken from Grimmauld Place…

With all his might he tried to break the eye contact with the dark wizard, tried to close his eyes, tried not to think of Lupin, even tried to sing loud and dirty songs – but to no avail. Helplessly he watched again how Lupin pulled a picture of a silver locket out of his pocket and showed it to him.

And then it was suddenly over.

An eerie quietness had settled over the hall. Taking a deep breath, Mundungus looked around to find the three Deatheater's glances shift uneasily from their master, to the exit, to each other. Voldemort himself stood stock-still. Even though the livid flicker in his red eyes seemed to be the only reaction to what he just saw in Fletcher's memories, a cold fury was radiating from the Dark Lord.

Suspecting that something terrible was about to happen, Mundungus attempted to stand up and found to his surprise that he was ignored. Just when he had managed to reach a vertical position and made the first cautious step backwards, the torches on the wall suddenly flickered and went out and Mundungus felt a wave of cold rolling over him.

"Dolohov, keep an eye on the werewolf," were the last words he heard before his world exploded in icy darkness.

Leaving his three Deatheaters and the lifeless column of ice behind, Voldemort rushed out of his throne hall, heading for a cave which he hadn't set foot in for almost two decades.

Harry took a deep breath of relief when he stepped out of Gringotts into the bright sunshine of Diagon Alley. And judging from the look of his four companions, he wasn't the only one to be glad about leaving the tense, vigilant and distrustful atmosphere of the wizarding bank behind him.

The five witches and wizards had expected to encounter security measures. That's why they had come here so early in the morning. Actually, it had even taken much less time than they had expected, due to the few customers at this time of day. But it had made Harry, Ron and Hermione, who hadn't been at Gringotts for more than a year, sad to see, how the goblin-led bank had turned from a fascinating, secretive, respectable world of dark tunnels, shining gold, and neck-breaking rides into a sterile and intimidating high-security area.

With some more time to spend before they had to meet the rest of the Potter family and Sirius in Godric's Hollow, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Remus and Tonks strolled through Diagon Alley. There weren't too many shoppers around yet. The wizard street in the middle of London looked less dreary and hushed then one year ago, as normalcy had more or less returned. But it seemed to have lost the cheerfulness and busy activity it had, when Hagrid had first showed Harry the shopping district for wizards and witches.

As the others talked about this and that, Harry was caught deeply in his thoughts and after a while he found himself looking intently at almost every shop window, looking out for a fitting birthday present for Ginny. Tomorrow she would turn sixteen, but Harry realized that so far, he had pushed the thought about what he should give her as a present, into the back of his mind. What do you buy for the girl you love, who loves you as well, if you are not together with her – and won't be until a certain dark lord is defeated.

"Harry? Harry!" Harry looked up to see that the other four were standing a few steps in front of him and had turned around, apparently waiting for him to move on.

"Harry, we think it's time to apparate to Godric's Hollow," said Tonks and looked at her watch.

Harry nodded and closed the distance between them, slightly embarrassed to be caught daydreaming.

"Okay, you all have studied the map and know were to go?" asked Tonks in the professional tone of an Auror. The three teenagers nodded.

"Good. We'll apparate in the garden behind the ruins of your parents house, Harry," she instructed and Harry felt his stomach jolt, when she mentioned the destroyed house. "Let's go." She vanished with a soft pop.

Harry sighed. Now he still didn't have a present for Ginny. He breathed in deeply and followed the others. Harry had known how to apparate for quite some time now, but only had gotten his license a bit more than a week ago. On his birthday, when Mr. Weasley had picked him up to leave the Dursleys forever, he had taken him directly to the Ministry of Magic for his apparation test, before they had moved on to the Burrow.

The uncomfortable feeling of being pressed through a narrow tube, which always came with apparating, passed and Harry, Ron, Hermione, Remus and Tonks landed in a colourful knee-high ocean of grasses and summer flowers, which apparently belonged to a garden, that hadn't been looked after for a long time.

The sun was shining brightly through lush cherry and apple trees, creating a green-golden light and the air was rich with a heavy, sweet smell.

Hidden in the middle of this paradise for birds, insects and wild plants were the ruins of a house; and nature was doing its best to claim the old walls for itself. The roof was caved in and a blackberry bush was fighting its way out of the rubble. A young birch was growing out of what had once been the living room.

Harry couldn't turn his eyes away from this playground for nature. He felt deeply touched by the mixture of destruction and creation, the thought that he and his parents had lived here one and a half decades ago, pounding behind his forehead. At the same time he felt a strange kind of detachment as he caught himself thinking 'I wouldn't want to know what I would feel if I didn't have the knowledge of my parents being alive'

Noticing the faraway look on Harry's face, Hermione touched his shoulder concernedly.

"Harry, are you alright?"

"Yeah," he breathed as he slowly walked towards the broken down house.

When he reached the porch it became harder to move through the young bushes and trees, which partly hid the uneven ground. Carefully checking the firmness underneath his feet, he climbed into the former living room and held on to the trunk of the birch for better balance.

Ron and Hermione followed him in some distance. When Harry noticed their insecurity, he smiled softly.

"It's okay. It would have been hard to come here, if they had..." he broke off and turned away from his friends. Then he shook his head and started taking a closer look at his surroundings.

Two walls of the room were still standing, although the ceiling was missing completely. Among the rubble and plants lay some wooden splinters and boards, which had once been furniture.

Harry could make out a round tabletop with one leg still sticking out from the underside. A thick piece of fabric, which with some fantasy was still recognizable as a carpet, was trapped between two heavy stone plates.

"This place seems so unreal," said Hermione softly. "It's so peaceful and beautiful, that it is impossible to imagine the terrible things that happened here."

Harry nodded. He suddenly had the unrestrained urge to run and see his parents. Determinately he climbed back to Remus and Tonks, who had waited in the garden. "Let's go meet up with the others," he said with a hoarse voice.

From the street the ruins of the house and garden were barely visible, due to a wildly growing hedge. If the whole area wasn't hidden by a muggle repelling charm, it surely was an eyesore of the small and clean town of Godric's Hollow.

As Remus, Tonks and the three teenagers walked along the street, they noticed how unusually many families with small children were cheerfully strolling along the sidewalks. Small children were holding balloons on strings and some had funny make-up on their faces, turning them into cats or clowns. The distant rumble of very loud music and a far-away sound of someone speaking through a microphone reached their ears.

"There seems to be some kind of celebration downtown," said Hermione.

"Maybe we can go there later, after we have picked up the rest, and take a look?" suggested Ron hopefully.

"Yeah," said Harry sarcastically. "I want a clown's face." He was still in a strange mood after visiting the house were he had spent the first one and a half years of his life.

"Harry!" said Hermione reproachfully, while Ron looked slightly hurt at his best friend.

Harry blushed guiltily. "Sorry, Ron. I bet Leo and Amy would like to go to the festival, too. Actually I don't think it's such a bad idea. What do you think, Remus?"

Remus exchanged an amused glance with Tonks. "Why not? We can ask the others in a minute. Mr. Hyalin's shop is right there."

Tonks and the three teenagers waited outside the rather shabby looking wooden shed, which housed "Hyalin's Finest Staffs and Wands", while Remus went inside to bring his friends the money, they needed to pay for the five wands.

It didn't take long, before Remus, Sirius and Harry's family emerged from the crooked building. After having seen the destroyed house in the morning, Harry hadn't even realized how relieved and happy he was now, to see his parents and brother and sister walking towards him.

Cheerfully walking forward to meet them, Harry stopped abruptly when he saw the sorrowful faces of the four adults and the shocked and disappointed expression on Leo's and Amy's faces. Catching his mother's eye, Harry suspected immediately that his fear had come true. His brother and sister were indeed squibs.

The warm and sunny August day, with dozens of happy families on the street, celebrating some kind of village festival stood in a surreal contrast to the subdued and embarrassed silence which had settled among the group of witches and wizards, standing at a street corner in Godric's Hollow.

"Maybe we've jumped into the wrong book," said Amy morosely. "I don't remember reading anything about spending a week cooped up in gloomy hovel – and then finally getting out, only to learn that in this world everyone can do magic, but us. Just great!" Her voice was full of cynicism.

"Maybe it's best if we go back to Grimmauld Place," suggested James quietly.

His words were greeted with some half-hearted nods and shoulder-shrugs. Listlessly the group started walking back to the former Potter residence, from where they could apparate home without being seen.

Suddenly, when they were still a block away from their destination the volume of the ever-present music around them increased and seemed to come closer from behind them.

The people around them were crowded at the edge of the sidewalk and stared at the empty street in unconcealed excitement and curiosity.

"What's going on?" Ron's question was drowned in the cheering of the crowd, as a group of flag-bearing girls came dancing around the corner.

As the sidewalk was now so full with spectators that the large group of wizards and witches would have to struggle to get through without loosing each other, they stopped to watch the procession, much to Ron's delight.

"Look at that car! Dad would love it!" The redhead resembled a four-year old in a sweetshop, as he pointed at the colourfully decorated festival wagons.

"It's the Gryffin Maid Festival," explained Lily. "It's always on the second weekend of August. I had totally forgotten that it is today."

"Gryffin Maid? I thought Godric's Hollow is a muggle village?" shouted Hermione over the loud music and cheering.

"Yes, mainly muggles live here, but the village was founded Godric Gryffindor. The Gryffin Maid festival is based on a legend out of this time. I don't remember how it went, but we can see if we get a programme somewhere. It should be written in there." Lily had to lean close to Hermione's ear to make herself understood in all the noise.

Hermione nodded and looked up to see a beautiful carriage being drawn by four white horses, which each had a horn tied to their fore heads, so that they resembled unicorns. The wagon was escorted by six young men, carrying crossbows and on the wagon stood a teenage girl, with fake bright red hair, smiling and waving at the crowds, and making a curtsey every now and then.

"So, that's the Gryffin Maid then?" Hermione asked loudly and Lily nodded.

The wagon of the Gryffin Maid had been the last one of the parade and slowly the crowd began to disperse.

Remus and Sirius were already leading the way towards the ruined house, with the others following them. Hermione looked around, were she could quickly get a programme, as she didn't want to let the others wait.

"Excuse me," she approached a young woman next to her. "Could you tell me, where I can get a brochure about today?"

The young woman seemed to be in a hurry herself, as she turned her head searchingly and distractedly put a leaflet into Hermione's hand. "Here, you can have mine. I'll get another one." The next moment she was gone.

Hermione grinned and jogged a few steps to catch up with Harry and Ron, who seemed to be looking for her already.

Not five minutes later all ten of them had landed in the sitting room of Grimmauld Place again. The parade had somewhat lessened the disappointment of earlier today, but now every one seemed to be content to let themselves fall into a comfortable armchair or on the sofa and loose themselves in their own thoughts.

Of course their return hadn't stayed unnoticed and after only a few minutes of lazy silence, the door to the sitting room opened and Mrs. Weasley and Ginny walked in. Taking in the scene before her eyes, a broad smile grew on Mrs. Weasley's lips.

"Now, don't tell me that half a day of shopping exhausted you like this."

"I guess it takes some practice to move through the town with such a large horde," joked Lily.

Harry tuned out their friendly banter. When he had seen Ginny, a hot jolt had unsettled his stomach. How was he going to get a present for her now? Maybe it wasn't too late to order something by owl. But what? Maybe something from this village festival? The Gryffin Maid on the last parade wagon had reminded him of Ginny.

With a furtive look at the redhead girl, he turned to Hermione, who was reading in the programme of the Gryffin Maid Festival. He stood up and sat next to her. With a smile Hermione held the leaflet between them, so that both of them could read.

_Gryffin Maid_

_The Gryffin Maid Festival has a long and proud tradition of more than nine hundred years in Godric's Hollow. Every August the inhabitants of the small village honour the founder of the village, Godric Gryffindor. Legend tells that upon his death, Godric Gryffindor promised his closest followers that a maid of his blood would protect the people when dark days were falling over the country again. Born in the time of harvest, the Gryffin Maid would be heralded by six Sons of Fire._

"Heralded by six Sons of Fire?" Hermione frowned at the leaflet.

Harry looked at her. He had the feeling that he knew what this meant, but he couldn't quite grasp it. He looked around the room and his gaze fell on Ron, who was talking animatedly to Leo. Harry's brother seemed conflicted whether to keep his bad mood or whether to let himself be infected by Ron's enthusiasm about the parade.

Smiling, he watched his brother and his best friend. Maybe it would be easier for Leo and Amy to accept that they were Squibs, with all of their help.

Suddenly Ron threw his head back in laughter and the light caught in his hair, making it look as though it was on fire for half a second. Harry's eyes grew round in surprise. "The six Sons of Fire," he whispered. "Ron, Fred, George, Percy, Charlie and Bill. Now, tell me if I'm wrong, but couldn't that mean that Ginny is the Gryffin Maid?"

A/N: So, from the next chapter on this story will be AU. I guess it will be hard to write on, knowing what will really happen in Harry's 7th year. I mean, I have my plot all planned out, but I really hope that my ideas were totally different than those of JKR. See you after Deathly Hallows


	23. The Magic of Squibs

Chapter 23 – The Magic of Squibs

**Chapter 23**** – The Magic of Squibs**

Hermione stared at Harry, so that he could almost see her brain working feverishly. "But if the legend refers to Ginny, it would mean that the Weasleys are direct descendents from Godric Gryffindor," she whispered with a quick glance at Ron. "Then how can it be that they have so little social prestige in the wizarding world, if they descend from one of Hogwart's founders?"

"Just think how much prestige the Gaunts had in the Wizarding World as descendents of Salazar Slytherin," Harry couldn't help to comment ironically. "Maybe the Weasleys do not even know about their heritage," he added in a placatory way when he noticed Hermione's glare. "And even if they know about it, Ron's whole family never has overly cared about wealth and fame and all that.

"Well, Ron certainly doesn't know. Otherwise the whole school would have known, before he had even been sorted," Hermione commented with a smile.

Harry nodded, his lips also twitching. "I guess we should leave it like that for now."

"Yes, we'd better research Gryffindor's bloodline first, before we tell Ron something like that," Hermione agreed. "If their family really descends from Gryffindor, we might find a hint about another Horcrux, don't you think?"

Harry shrugged. "The best known relic of Gryffindor is his sword, which definitely is no Horcrux. Don't forget that Gryffindor has been dead for a thousand years. Any other relics of him might be gone fore--"

Harry was interrupted as Hermione stepped on his foot and made hectical movements with her eyes, indicating that Ron was approaching.

"What are you two talking about?" their best friend asked with a furrowed brow and eyed Harry and Hermione suspiciously for a long moment.

"Oh nothing. Thanks for cheering up Leo and Amy. They have been practising to do some magic so hard all last week."

Ron nodded. "Yeah, too bad they are squibs, but who cares? They are still okay..."

That evening Harry went up to his room right after dinner, now having the pressure on his shoulders to finally get a birthday present ready for Ginny, as he had pushed it forward time and time again.

Sitting on his bed he leaned back his head and stretched. "Now, come on, Harry, just a little present," he enchanted himself. Already knowing that he wouldn't find the right thing for Ginny in there, he listlessly flicked through a catalogue of Flourish and Blotts. He wouldn't get her a book anyway. It had to be something very personal, but something, which he could give her as a good friend, not as a boyfriend. So jewellery was out of question too.

Harry's eyes wandered around the room, hoping to find inspiration somewhere. And suddenly Harry knew what he should be giving to Ginny. His glance had rested on a picture of the two of them in their Quidditch clothes, grinning broadly from extremely muddy faces, arms around each other's shoulders. Knowing that this was the perfect present, Harry felt totally elated. Now he only needed a nice frame to the picture. He took the Flourish and Blotts catalogue again to flip through the sections with gift ideas. There was a nice frame with chess pieces but that didn't really fit and all the others looked too childish.

If I make one on my own, I could probably have a much better one in the end, Harry thought, getting frustrated with the catalogue. Getting some old Quidditch magazines and his wand, he set to work.

Harry had lost his sense of time while working on the frame for Ginny's picture. So he was quite surprised to see that it was already dark outside when he finally looked up from his finished work. He was just transfiguring some newspaper pages into wrapping paper, when someone knocked on his door. In worry that it might be Ginny, he hastily stuffed everything into an already quite full drawer of his desk.

However, it wasn't Ginny. Hermione walked into the room, carrying two old books, smiling triumphantly.

"Look," she held two books towards him excitedly. "I hadn't imagined researching Gryffindor's ancestors would be so easy."

Harry gave up on shoving the drawer shut and came closer, so that he could see the titles of the books. "Chronic of the Great Four – The history of the Hogwarts Founders and their families," he read loudly. "Okay, this one I can understand, but 'Curious anecdotes on the Oldest Wizarding families'? Do you expect to find something useful in there?"

"Found already," she told him, grinning like a Cheshire cat, leafing through the pages. "Here – I got it."

_A hairy love story_

_In the uncertain and dangerous times of the Great Muggle Emancipation and, connected with it, the Inquisition, there lived a young squib with the name of Frederick with his wife Mathilda, who was a daughter of Jason Gryffindor. Mathilda was awaiting a child and the war was raging fiercely in the country. The young family was in danger from the Pure Brothers, a group of wizards who fanatically believed in segregation of wizards and muggles, squibs and magical creatures. So Frederick and Mathilda had hidden in a cottage in the Welsh mountains. There they lived in relative peace with their dog Fox, which had long flaming red hair._

_However, one day in late October even the hide-out in the mountains did not protect the young couple from the Pure Brothers. Half a dozen wizards with fiercely painted faces raided the hut and while Mathilda and Frederick did their best to defend themselves, they where soon cornered by the attackers due to Mathilda's pregnancy and Fredericks inability to do magic. _

_When all seemed lost already Fox was the one who attacked the intruders from behind and took out four of them at once. And so the Pure Brothers were put to flight._

_Frederick was so grateful. "The memory of Fox, the dog, shall live on forever in this family," he said. And indeed that was what happened. Even though it happened in a way neither Frederick nor Mathilda had foreseen. All of their seven children had hair in the flaming colour of Fox' fur. That was the only bit of magic Frederick had ever done in his life._

"Sounds a bit kitschy, if you ask me," Harry said with a shrug. "And apart from the red hair it has not much to do with the Weasleys, does it? I reckon there are thousands of wizards out there who have red hair."

Hermione smiled. "That's written in the other book." She opened 'Chronic of the Great Four' at a marked page and handed it to Harry. The page was covered in small and curved letters, which were not so easy for Harry to decipher. There was no headline on the page and Harry did not know where he should start to read. Hermione pointed somewhere at the bottom of the page.

"_The bloodline of the __honourable Gryffindor Family basically ended in 1383, when Mathilda Gryffindor married the squib F. Wesly, and thereby made the blood of the Gryffindors worthless."_

Harry raised his eyebrows. "Wow," he whispered. "I only wonder why nobody ever made this connection before."

Hermione shrugged. "Maybe some people did. I'm sure Dumbledore knew. And I wouldn't be surprised if Mrs. and Mr. Weasley know about it, too. And just look, how different these two books with the crucial information are. They definitely do not appeal to the same group of readers."

Harry nodded. "Do you think, we should tell Ron about it?"

Before Hermione could answer, horrible screaming and thudding was heard from downstairs. The two teens stared at each other with wide eyes for a second, before they lunged for the door, racing down the narrow staircase.

Ron was really nice. Leo hadn't thought that the red-head would spend so much time and energy to lighten up his mood. But Ron had sat with him, suffered his bad mood for nearly twenty minutes and finally had managed to make him laugh and even let him forget for a little while that he and his sister would never be fully accepted in the wizarding society.

However, now Ron was off to talking to Ginny, and Leo was alone again with his feeling of being incomplete and somehow handicapped. Not knowing what to do with himself, not even knowing whether he wanted to be alone or preferred company, Leo had taken to aimlessly wander the corridors of Grimmauld Place Number 12. Somehow he found the sinister atmosphere of the interior of the Black family home fitting to his mood.

How often had he dreamt of being in the same world as his brother, ever since his parents had told him about the wizarding world. How often had he imagined, how Harry and he would stand together against evil, fighting heroically against Voldemort and his Deatheaters – only never in those dreams had he guessed that he would be so utterly useless in this fight – only adding to the sorrows of the others. How shocked, sad and embarrassed they had all looked, when he and Amy had learned that they would never do magic. How they all had done their best to pretend that it was not so bad after those first shocked seconds. How they had tried to act optimistically for his and his sisters sake.

Leo felt all these thoughts circling in his mind wildly, leaving a funny, tight feeling in his stomach. It didn't feel as though he would be sick, it didn't hurt in any way – it didn't even feel particularly uncomfortable. Just tight. As though his guts were clenching hard around a box of explosives, which would blow up in the moment, when he could not hold on to it any longer – and holding on got harder from minute to minute.

Not even realizing how loud and struggled his breathing had become, he passed through the corridor in front of the kitchen and jumped in fright as suddenly the curtain in front of Mrs. Black's portrait swung aside, revealing the old and ugly witch.

"Scum! Worthless squib! Out of my house!" The screaming and screeching rang obtrusively through the whole house, ringing in Leo's ears.

He jumped to his feet. "Shut up! Shut the bloody hell up!" He darted forward and before he even realized what he was doing, his fist connected with the canvas. In frenzy, he punched and kicked at the picture, losing himself in the surge of triumphant energy flowing, as he felt the canvas tear and heard Mrs. Black's pained screams. From far away he heard the hustled steps and shouts of Harry and his parents. Leo couldn't tell how long he had raged at the portrait, when suddenly the wooden wall behind it gave way to his kicks. With a startled cry he lost balance and fell against the wall, as his foot caught in the hole, he had kicked. Bumping his head hard and tearing the skin of his right leg at the splinters, he cursed loudly and foully.

Exhausted, emotionally drained and in pain he lay still in the rubble and groaned softly, while he slowly became aware of his family, all the Weasleys, Hermione, Remus, Tonks and Sirius staring at him.

Flushing deeply red, Leo slowly sat up in between of all the wooden splinters and dust. "Well, er, I got rid of the picture. I had the feeling, nobody really liked it around here," he said quietly, not being able to look into the faces of the fourteen people, crowded around him.

"Respect! I've tried to take her down several times, but I've never thought of approaching that task without magic." Sirius grinned broadly, while he offered his hand to help the boy up.

"Don't worry about the wall. The good you have done, surpasses the damage," he added, still being visibly amused.

"Are you alright?" Lily rushed forward, her face pale. "Did you hurt yourself?"

"It's okay, Mum." Leo inconspicuously brushed his pants smooth above his injured leg.

"Really, it's nothing."

"What is behind that wall anyway?" asked Ginny, craning her neck to see inside the big hole in the wall, without having to step into the rubble.

Sirius shrugged, exchanging a glance with James. The two men stepped forward and together they started pulling at the remaining panels, Remus joining them a second later.

After less than ten minutes the hole was big enough for a man to crouch through.

"You won't believe it!" Sirius exclaimed from the other side of the wall. A second later his head appeared, a huge mischievous grin on his face, reaching from one ear to the other. As the others were looking at him expectantly, he held his hand forward. A small oval silver thing was dangling down from Sirius' hand.

In disbelief the fourteen people surrounding Sirius stared at the small silver piece of jewellery.

"Is that...? Sirius, if you dare joke about something like that," said Molly Weasley, her voice shaking with a curious combination of hope, surprise and suspicion.

Harry shook his head and stepped forward to his godfather. "No, Mrs. Weasley, Sirius is not joking." Harry raised his hand to touch the cold silver, but when he was only a few centimetres away from it, he hesitated, a disgusted scowl on his face.

"Hey, Harry. Don't pull such a face! We found the Locket! Three down, three to go!" crowed Fred.

"Yeah, exactly! Half time before we can finish You-Know-Who!" added George.

Harry forced a small smile. The Locket made him feel uneasy, as if it was observing him. "You're right. We only need to find out how to destroy it."

"And look what else is in here!" came Sirius voice again from the niche behind the destroyed portrait of Mrs. Black.

He held a thin, leather-bound book in his hand as he climbed back over the rubble in the corridor. He had leafed through the pages and held it open to reveal a rough sketch of cup, with an H engraved in the front.

A proud smile lit up Sirius' face. "Regulus was really busy with his Horcrux hunt. I would have never thought that my brother had it in him."


	24. The Hunt begins

**Chapter 24 ****– The Hunt begins**

The man with the long dark cloak received strange glances from the lightly clad guests and visitors of the Gryffin Maid Festival in Godric's Hollow. The man stared back at them and the people quickly looked away and turned towards their amusement again, soon forgetting the strange figure.

Antonin Dolohov grinned wolfishly. It had been one of his easier tasks to locate Remus Lupin. If you wanted to find any person, you applied a tracking charm – a complicated and time-consuming procedure. If you wanted to find a werwolf, you only needed the werwolf by which the other was bitten. And Fenrir Greyback was very eager to help Dolohov find Lupin.

Dolohov had arrived in Godric's Hollow shortly after noon. It was easy enough to observe the werewolf in this crowd, especially since Lupin was not alone, but togehter with a bunch of people. The Potter brat and his friends were there with him, along with a family Dolohov didn't know and a large black dog. Dolohov was curious what the lot of them were doing in Godric's Hollow. They hadn't come for the festival. That much was clear. The mood in the group was rather downcast.

Inconspiciously Dolohov followed them towards the less crowded regions of the village. He had to stay further behind the group now, in order not to be discovered. But he wasn't afraid of losing his target, since a group of almost a dozen persons was hard to miss. So around twenty minutes later he watched Lupin and the others enter a wooden, run-down hut.

Dolohov quickly checked that no-one was looking at him before he ducked around the corner of the house to peek through the dusty windows. He was just in time to see Lupins girlfriend vanish in a fireplace. Dolohov cursed, stood up and entered the shed.

On old man with a small and wrinkly face approached him.

"Good day to you, sir." The edges of his colourless lips twitched upwards, as he bowed his head just a tad. "I assume you are here for a wand or a staff?"

Dolohov ignored the old man, rushed through the open door at the end of the shop and stared disappointedly in the room with the public fire place. "Damn!" he cursed as he rounded on Hyalin. "Where have they gone?"

"Sir, this is a public fire place. If I was to remember the destinations of all travellers my head would be much fuller than I would care for." He shot the darkly clad wizard a cheeky and boyish grin.

Dolohov took an angry step away from the old man, while pulling his wand. "Crucio!" he cried and watched in perverse satisfaction how Hyalin collapsed on the floor, shrieking and convulsing in pain. Dolohov held the curse for almost a minute until Hyalin had lost his consciesness. Then he stepped over the body into the other room, knelt in front of the fire place, and pointed his wand in the ashes. The spell, he was going to use was not very reliable in public fire places, but as this large crowd had surely travelled to the same place, chances were that it worked. "_Revelatio Destinatio_," he said. And indeed, flames errupted and an image of the house, which had been surveyed by the Death Eaters for a long time, appeared in the fire. The house, where the head quarter of Dumbledore's rebellious group was assumed - Grimmauld Place No. 12.

Not so surprising, Dolohov thought disappointedly. The building was still heavily warded and the information that Lupin had gone there didn't help him, as he couldn't reach him there.

But who was the family, which had accompanied Lupin, Potter and the others? If they were new members of the Order of the Phoenix, Dolohov had better find out more about them. He shrugged, cast a S_ilencio_ charm on the shed and returned to Hyalin to wake him up and question him some more.

***

The message, Voldemort had retrieved from Fletcher's memories was deeply disturbing. Did the Order of the Phoenix know about the Horcruxes? It was almost impossible. How should they have gathered knowledge about them? Still, why else should the werewolf have tried to collect information on Slytherins Locket?

No, Voldemort did not want to risk his immortality. Therefore he set out to the cave where the Horcrux was hidden as soon as he had killed Fletcher.

The sun was slowly setting over the churning ocean, bathing the cliffs in a rich golden light. Voldemort, who had no eye for the beautiful sunset strode purposefully towards the edge of the cliff, hesitated only for a second before he flew down to the hidden entrance of the cave, where the Slytherin Locket was securely hidden. Of cause it would be securely hidden there – what else?

With frantically beating heart and slightly trembling hands – a condition no Death Eater would ever survive seeing him in – Voldemort pressed his hand against the rough and wet stone. The sealing spell he had used on the cave, required the person who sought entry, to have blood on his hands.

A silver arch appeared, forming an opening in the rock. Voldemort stepped through it and found himself in a large circular cave, which was mostly filled by a black and smooth lake. A weak green light, which came from the middle of the lake, illuminated the cave eerily.

A foreboding feeling of uneasiness threatened to overwhelm him. Someone had been here. His fear changed into searing wrath, as he stepped into the boat to float to the small island in the center of the lake. The magic that allowed him to fly did not work above the dark and silent water.

Panic and desperate fury built up in him as he waited for the boat to finally reach the island, where the stone basin was filled with the emerald liquid, which protected one seventh of his soul, just as he had left it seventeen years ago.

He took a deep steadying breath. Everything was fine. It was still there.

Voldemort laid his hands on the opposite sides of the rim of the stone basin. Whispering the ancient spell in parseltongue, he watched how the emerald liquid rose upwards in a spiral and dissolved into green mist, which lingered above his head, further illuminating the island.

Finally the basin was empty.

Completely empty. There was no locket.

Voldemort tugged his hands away from the basin as if it had burned him. It was gone. The cave had been the perfect hiding place. And who would have known about the locket being a Horcrux anyway?

Thousand fragments of thought were whirling through his head as he stared unseeingly into the now dry and bare sandstone-bowl. A deep fear, all-consuming, as he had never felt it before, wormed its way through his guts leaving utter numbness behind; until feeling – an uncontrollable, burning rage - rushed back into his body.

The ground, he was standing on, started to tremble and ripples were showing on the lake's surface, slowly growing to waves, as the water rushed away from the island, building up at the edges of the cave. Inferi, which had been hidden by the dark water rose and stumbled helplessly towards the cave walls, as if shoved by an invisible force. Millions of liters of water and thousands of dead bodys were pressed all against the cave walls. Until the sound of rushing water and shuffling limbs ceased and for a few seconds there was silence.

Then the cave burst open with a thunder.

***

Sirius was still proudly holding his brothers journal in his hands, when suddenly Harry screamed and clutched his forehead. His knees buckled and James had to react fast to catch his son, so that he didn't drop to the floor. Carefully James lowered Harry, whose body convulsed, to the floor. Holding his head with both hands, he rolled back and forth jerkily, thrashing wildly with his legs.

Lily knelt beside him in an instant. "Harry! Harry, what's wrong?" She reached out to take his hand, but couldn't pry it away from his forehead.

"It's You-Know-Who," Ron whispered in a scared voice, staring anxiously at his best friend.

"Harry! Close your mind! Keep him out! Come on, please!" Hermione cried, tears in her eyes.

Helplessly Leo and Amy stood together with the Weasleys, Remus, Tonks and Sirius and watched in fear as their parents and Harry's best friends were trying to help him somehow. But with Harry convulsing on the floor and not reacting in any way to their effort; and with the other adults standing there as clueless as Amy and Leo themselves, the twins felt that something bad indeed was happening.

More than ten minutes had passed, when Harry finally lay still, his body going limp, as he slipped into unconsciousness. The quietness after Harrys screams pressed heavily on all of their ears; and Lily's suggestion to get a blanket for Harry and to put him into the living room, sounded unnaturally loud.

However, when James and Sirius bent down to pick the unconscious teenager up, his eyes fluttered open. Harry stared at the crowd standing worriedly around him, as if wondering where so many people had come from. Finally he made to shake his head, winced and brought up his hand to hold his forehead.

Lily was with him in an instant and took him in her arms.

"Harry, are you hurt?" She felt his forehead. "You're covered in cold sweat."

Harry ignored her and stared at Ron and Hermione. "He knows," he croaked quietly.

"Who knows what?" asked James with a frown.

"Voldemort knows, we are after his Horcruxes." Uncomfortable and worried silence greeted his words. Harry could feel how his parents and his brother and sister were torn between their desire to ask, what had just happened, their worry about him and the realisation that he somehow knew Voldemorts thoughts and feelings. Of course they didn't know about the way his scar affected him, when Voldemort was feeling strong anger or happiness. He had never told them. Harry felt suddenly very tired and weak.

"Harry, what exactly have you seen?" Remus asked gently.

"He was in the cave. You know, where the Locket was hidden. He found, that it was gone and then he blew up the whole cave."

"I can see how that hurts, mate," Ron commented and Hermione shoved a sharp elbow in his sides while she threw him a glare.

Harry smiled weakly at his best friend and turned at Remus again. "I don't know what else happened, Voldemort was pretty mad, but after the cave collapsed, everything went black so I don't know what he is up to now."

"Maybe he didn't survive the cave-in," said Ron hopefully.

"No. I think I would know about that," answered Harry.

"Okay. That's enough now. Harry needs to rest." Mrs. Weasley stepped forward. Lily, who had been completely shocked and overwhelmed by the whole situation, smiled gratefully at the older witch and helped Harry up.

When Harry woke up the following morning, he felt knackered, but at least his scar didn't hurt any longer. Screwing his eyes shut against the bright sunlight, he remembered what had happened the evening before. Voldemort had found out about them hunting the Horcruxes. Now it would be even harder to destroy those, which were left.

Harry counted the objects, which were still on the list. The diary was gone. He had already destroyed it with the Basilisks tooth in his second year. Dumbledore had found and destroyed the ring. Now they had the locket, which had been hidden right here in Grimmauld Place. But so far they had no idea how to destroy it. That still left Hufflepuff's Cup, something of Ravenclaw or Gryffindor and Nagini.

It would not become easier to find the Horcruxes, now that Voldemort was warned. Sighing Harry climbed out of his bed and got dressed. He would go downstairs to find out, what the others thought about their chances now.

Harry had just closed the door behind him, when he remembered that it was Ginny's birthday today. Grabbing the wrapped present for her, he made his way to the kitchen. Ginny met him halfway.

"Good morning. Feeling better?" She smiled at him and Harry noticed again how beautiful she was.

"Yes, thanks." Harry just realized that he hadn't been alone with Ginny since he had broken up with her. Suddenly he felt very self-conscious.

"Happy Birthday, Ginny," he said, smiling. But as he gave her the present, Harry couldn't bring himself to look her into the eye. Thanking him, Ginny took the wrapped package and turned it over in her hands, her face slightly red.

"You can open it," Harry said nervously after an awkward pause.

Slowly and carefully Ginny removed the paper from the present and looked at the framed picture, which showed her and Harry in their Quidditch gear, arms around each other.

"Thank you, Harry. That's a beautiful picture, and you made the frame yourself. I—I really like it. Thank you," she whispered, her eyes swimming.

"Ginny, you know that I had to break up with you. I didn't want to!" Harry blurted out suddenly. "But I can't stand the thought of you getting hurt because of me."

"I know," she said quietly. Then she abruptly turned around and ran up the stairs, disappearing into her room.

Helplessly Harry watched the empty stairway, wondering what he could have said or done better. He shook his head. No, it was best that he wasn't together with Ginny. Especially now. Voldemort knowing about his Horcruxes being hunted down was probably as dangerous as a wounded animal. Harry would never forgive himself, if anything happend to Ginny.

What a weird beginning of the day. Ginny, the Horcrux-hunt, his collaps from yesterday, Voldemorts unknown plans – all that was whirling around in Harry's thoughts and he had the feeling that he would scream, if things didn't become clearer soon.

As if in trance he continued his way to the kitchen. There he found his friends and family already sitting around the large table, discussing assidiously. The journal of Regulus Black lay open in between them.

"Harry, you're up! How are you feeling?" Lily and Molly stood up simultaniously to greet the exhausted-looking teenager.

"Mum, Mrs. Weasley, I'm fine, really. What did you find in the journal?" Harry ducked away between the two women and pulled up a chair, looking curiously at the others.

"My brother found out about the Horcruxes when he borrowed Kreacher to Voldemort one day. Kreacher was supposed to drink some potion to protect the locket and then Voldemort left him behind to die. But as Regulus had ordered Kreacher to return to him after he has assisted Voldemort, the elf could escape with his life," Sirius informed Harry, while Lily was putting a steaming cup of hot chocolate in front of Harry while Mrs. Weasley spooned a huge portion of scrambled egg on his plate.

"We have not read through the entire journal yet," Ron piped up, while Harry was pushing the egg around on his plate. "But it seems like Regulus was really pissed that Voldemort wanted to kill Kreacher – don't ask me why..."

"Ron!" cried Hermione outragedly.

"What? So, anyway Regulus wanted to find out more about all the stuff, and recognized the Locket as a Horcrux," Ron continued, after he had rolled his eyes at Hermione.

"And, you know what's best?" he said excitedly. "The Hufflepuff cup is also mentioned in here!"

Now Harry was fully alert. "Does it say where it is? We have to find it, before Voldemort gets it back." Harry leaned forward and grabbed the book, leafing through the pages.

"Here, Regulus writes that he heard Rookwood talk about a silver cup and the Dark Lord going somewhere himself," said James. "That makes us believe that the Hufflepuff Cup is placed in the Ministry of Magic, as Rookwood worked in the Department of Mysteries, before he was captured."

Harry jumped to his feet. "So what are we waiting for? Voldemort will be on his way already to save all his Horcruxes. We have to be there earlier than him!"

In this moment the fireplace in the kitchen roared to life and a tall, black man climbed out of it. He was covered in scratches and dirt, sporting a deep cut across his right eye and a nasty burn on his left upper arm.

"Kingsley!" Tonks rushed towards the newcomer. "What happend?"

"There was an attack on the ministry," he began to recount in a strained voice, while he threw an uncertain glance at the Weasleys.

Harry let himself fall into his seat again. Too late. Voldemort had retrieved the Hufflepuff Cup already.

"They were trying to kill Scrimgour," Kingsley continued. "They – they didn't succeed. Percy rescued the minister. He – he, I'm so sorry, Molly. He didn't survive."


	25. Back to the Burrow

**Chapter 25 – Back to the Burrow**

The message of Percy's death impacted like a bomb into the kitchen of Grimmauld Place No. 12. Mrs. Weasley made a move to stand up from her chair but didn't find the strength, so that she let herself collapse into the seat again.

"Percy," she whispered. "No, he lives. You must have misunderstood something. Percy didn't die." She registered barely how Mr Weasley sat next to her, clutching her hand tightly, as tears were silently running down her pale cheeks.

"What happened?" Mr. Weasley asked softly.

Kingsley Shacklebolt sighed heavily, pulled a chair towards him and sat down. "Voldemort and a group of Death Eaters have stormed the Ministry of Magic in the early hours of the morning. They had split up in two groups. While the group with Voldemort raided the Department of Mysteries, around a dozen were attacking the Auror Department. Minister Scrimgeour and Percy where down there at the moment in a meeting with me and Robards. The Death Eaters were aiming to kill the Minister, but Percy threw himself in the way, so that some other Aurors had time to get the Minister into safety."

"But why?" Mrs. Weasley sobbed.

"We have no idea so far what they wanted. They were not prepared well and after our first surprise we were able to kill four Death Eaters and catch another six. Only two escaped us. I'm sure they only attacked us as a distraction. However, we don't know yet what Voldemort's group wanted down in the Department of Mysteries. They wrecked havoc at the place and we have yet to see if anything is missing." Kingsley ended his report and leaned back in his chair looking thoroughly exhausted.

Leo saw his brother and Hermione looking at each other significantly and noticed how his parents exchanged similar glances with Sirius and Remus.

"Where is Percy now?" asked Mrs. Weasley softly into the silence after Kingsley's words.

"Still at the Ministry," he answered flatly.

"I want to see him." Mrs. Weasley stood up and stepped resolutely towards the fireplace. Mr. Weasley, who had not let go of her hand, was following her.

Kingsley hesitated for a second, before he nodded. "Of course. We can go now."

It was as though Mr. and Mrs. Weasley had taken all the air out of the kitchen when they left together with Kingsley Shacklebolt. Everyone looked surreptiously at Fred, George and Ron who absently stared into nothingness.

Hermione cleared her throat uncomfortably. "Someone should tell Ginny," she murmured to no one in particular. Then she turned carefully towards Ron, who sat next to her.

"Ron? Is everything... I mean, are you okay?"

Ron shook his head. "That brat! Why did he have to go and get himself killed? Why did he have to be so god-damn brave, when he was such an opportunistic coward all the time before?"

Patting Ron's shoulder gently, Hermione looked helplessly at Harry, asking him with her eyes what to do now.

Harry shrugged uncomfortably. Not knowing, what else to do, he moved closer to his two best friends, saying nothing. From the corner of his eyes he noticed, how his parents led Amy and Leo out of the kitchen.

"I'll go and get Ginny," offered Remus softly, before he also left the kitchen feeling apparently lost.

Fred and George were sitting at the corner of the table, brooding with dark faces. Once in a while the exchanged bitter glances. "What an egoistic asshole," grumbled George.

Fred nodded. "Brave, loyal, heroic... towards the stupid ministry. Did he ever think of mum and dad, when he jumped in front of the bloody minister?"

The time seemed to have stopped as they all sat in the kitchen, everyone in their own thoughts, waiting for something – nobody knew what for. Sometime after Remus had left the room, Ginny entered, her eyes red-rimmed, and joined Ron, Hermione and Harry. She didn't say a word, so Harry guessed that Remus had told her everything already.

After what seemed like an eternity, Harry couldn't stand the depressive silence and immobility any more and excused himself, mumbling something about the bathroom. The Weasley's have always been like a family to Harry and it hurt him to see how they were hurt. But at the same time he felt like an intruder, watching them grieve without being able to help in any way. And Voldemort having managed to retrieve the Hufflepuff Cup from the Ministry made him want to act. In a flash of anger he thought that the whole fiasco could have been avoided, if the others would have acted immediately after they read about the cup – or if he himself hadn't been so weak to go to bed, when he knew exactly that Voldemort would be doing everything to bring his other Horcruxes into safety.

Harry shook his head. It was no use to blame anyone for the attack at the Ministry. Even if they had known beforehand, there was too little time to get the cup before Voldemort and warn everyone about a possible attack. Voldemort had just been too fast. It made it seem almost impossible to win this stupid war, when their enemy was always a step ahead of them.

In hope to find Sirius, Remus or his parents, Harry went upstairs. The four of them and Leo and Amy were in the sitting room, talking in hushed voices. Harry knocked quietly on the open door to draw the attention to himself before he took a seat between Remus and Leo. James and Lily were looking at their son intensively.

"So, you have a connection to Voldemort through that scar?" James asked, throwing an uncertain glance at Harry's forehead.

Harry nodded, looking at the floor. "Yes, it hurts when he gets angry or happy, and sometimes, when his emotions are especially strong I have visions. I can see through his eyes."

Sirius sat up in his armchair and hit the table with the journal of his brother. "Now, Voldemort is probably not resting, while we are sitting here. Our task of destroying his Horcruxes won't become easier with Voldemort knowing about us. That's, what we still have to do: Firstly, find out how to destroy the locket, secondly, get back the cup from Voldemort, thirdly, find out what the last Horcrux is and finally kill that stupid snake of his."

"That's right, Padfoot," said James with a grin. "Let's see, if we can take the afternoon off, so we get everything done."

"James!" Lily reprimanded her husband while rolling her eyes. "Not the right time for funny remarks."

Despite the situation Harry had to grin. His parents reminded him of his two best friends.

"I think we should start on the locket, as we have it here anyway and when we find a way to destroy it, we can use it on all the other Horcruxes too – and it might be possible that we have to act quickly then." Remus brought the attention back to the topic at hand.

"Right," agreed James. "But I think it makes sense to split up. We don't know what Voldemort will do next and I'd rather be working on all Horcruxes at once."

"We can leave the cup for now. As Voldemort has it anyway, it's not so urgent to get it. The priority should be on the locket and on the unknown last Horcrux," Lily said.

During the next half hour the seven of them were making up to-do-lists on these two main goals and assigning the single tasks.

Harry nodded, looking at the list with the assignments. He felt slightly better now that they were starting to develop a plan. "But what about the Weasley's and... and Percy?"

The atmosphere in the sitting room became grim and gloomy once more. "I'll go downstairs and see how they are doing," said Remus. Harry stood up as well and followed the werewolf into the kitchen.

Mr. and Mrs. Weasley had returned from the Ministry. When Remus and Harry entered the kitchen, Mr. Weasley looked up with empty eyes.

"We are going back to the Burrow." He had the voice of an old man.

"I think we should stay together," said Tonks. "It's not safe to split up now."

Mrs. Weasley nodded automatically. "Sure, the house is big enough."

The same evening Remus, Tonks and Kingsley Shacklebolt went to the Burrow to prepare the return of the Weasley family and to make sure all the wards were still in place. Furthermore they were turning the now empty henhouse into another bedroom, as not everyone would fit into the house. Sirius and Lily were working on a stable and secure floo-connection between Grimmauld Place and the Burrow, so that everyone could travel between these two houses but nobody had access to either of their fireplaces from the outside.

The Weasleys, Potters and Hermione followed after the next day. Percy's funeral was scheduled to take place two days later in Ottery St. Catchpole.

While Mrs. Weasley busied herself with the preparation of the funeral, the other members of the Weasley family were determined to put all their energy in the Horcrux hunt. Now that Voldemort had struck so close to home, the anger and the fear for the rest of the family made them feel restless and eager to bring down the dark wizard.

Remus, Lily and Hermione were sorting through the ancient dusty folios in Grimmauld Place library to find a clue about valuables in connection to any of the four Hogwarts founders. Leo and Amy were helping them by comparing newspaper clippings from the last twenty years. Now knowing that the Weasley family descended from Godric Gryffindor himself, Mr. Weasley, Ron, Ginny were looking through the cellars of the Burrow in hope to find some family secret. Tonks had managed to get into the team, which investigated the break-in in the Department of Mysteries. Fred and George were working day and night on developing new objects, which could help them in the practical part of their Horcrux hunt. James, Sirius and Harry were researching ways to destroy the locket.

The last two groups were making the fastest progress. Fred and George were already testing a spray that made you see everything in a mirror image. A quite simple effect with stunning results. When they tried it on each other, the twins were hardly able to find their way around the house they have lived in for 19 years.

James, Sirius and Harry had decided not to put too much time into researching new ways of destroying Horcruxes. They knew that basilisk venom would do the job and they knew where they could find a basilisk's body. Therefore the three of them were now planning how to get into Hogwarts, into the Chamber of Secrets and steal some teeth. As the school was empty during the summer, it should not be too difficult to enter it. The problem was mainly to get there without being seen.

In the end they decided to travel to Scotland by Muggle means, James using a glamour charm to slightly change his appearance. Sirius could transform into a dog and Harry would accompany them, hidden beneath the invisibility cloak. They would do it right after the funeral – if they could persuade mainly Lily and Molly that it was not too dangerous and Ron and Hermione that five people were too many for this mission.

The evening before the funeral everyone was sitting in the kitchen of the Burrow, discussing the results of the last two days of work and research. The place was quite cramped but the atmosphere was more relaxed than anyone could have imagined two days before.

"Look here!" Lily held up a newspaper clipping from 1728. "The Museum of Ancient Artefacts in Garrigill had a dagger and a lyre, which were the last items which could be assigned to Rowena Ravenclaw. Unfortunately these two objects were destroyed together with the whole museum when a cursed Egyptian amulet exploded and turned everything within a radius of 30 metres into dust."

"I mean, it's really a pity that such valuable objects were destroyed," added Hermione hastily. "But for us it's good to know that we are not looking for anything that belonged to Ravenclaw. So the last Horcrux must have something to do with Gryffindor."

The others in the kitchen nodded thoughtfully. "We might find a clue about Gryffindor's belongings somewhere in the house," said Mr. Weasley. "But Ron, Ginny and I can't do it by ourselves. Nobody has been in the cellars for decades and we could use a hand to help us clean the place up before we have any chance of finding something there."

"We could help!" cried Leo and Amy eagerly. Even if they had quite enough of cleaning and searching, as it was only a week ago that they were basically taking Grimmauld Place apart in search for the silver Slytherin Locket. But still, this task was much better than sitting over thousands of pages of century-old paper and parchment all day long.

Suddenly everyone in the kitchen went quite, listening to the knocking the front door. Mr. Weasley stood up and walked noiselessly up the corridor, while the others at the table stood up as well, pulling out their wands.

"Who is there?" Mr. Weasley shouted tersely.

"Hi, I'm back!" came Tonk's voice tiredly from the other side of the door.

Feeling relieved, they still left their wands out. "What is my favourite, when you transform your face?" asked Remus through the closed door.

"A black and white tigered cat," came the prompt response.

Mr. Weasley opened the door and Tonks entered, sporting exactly the cat-face she had just been talking of. Remus smiled at her and took her into his arms, while Ron grinned broadly at Hermione, who blushed bright red. Harry smiled. He too remembered that Hermione had looked almost like Tonks looked now, when she drank Polyjuice Potion with cat hair in their second year.

"How was it at the Ministry?" asked Remus as they all went back into the now even more crowded kitchen.

"Chaotic." Tonks sighed and was glad to take a seat. Her face was back to normal, her hair short and bright pink again. "They know now that it was indeed the Hufflepuff Cup, which was stolen by Voldemort. Nothing else is missing. However they have no clue, what he wants with the cup. The Auror department has made it their priority to figure out, where Voldemort has his hiding place and so far they have narrowed it down to the Cumbrian Mountains."

"Okay," murmured Lily as she was taking notes on all the information they had collected and all the plans they had made. Four pages of parchment documented the results of their work today.

Tonks yawned widely and Mr. Weasley looked at his watch. "I think we should call it a day," he said in a carefully controlled voice. "Tomorrow will be exhausting." He stood up and started clearing the table, Molly jumping to his side to help him.

One after the other they all went to their bedrooms. The twins had offered their room to Tonks and Remus, so that they were now sharing the henhouse with Leo, Harry and Ron. Lily and James were sleeping in Ron's room, while Sirius took the couch in the living room.

The five boys and Sirius were the last ones in the kitchen, when everyone else was going to bed and the house became quiet. Ron was taking butter beer out of the cupboard for every one.

"You know, we are fighting You-Know-Who and the Ministry is fighting him too," said Ron, playing absentmindedly with his bottle of butter beer. Not knowing, what his friend was on about, Harry looked up at him, waiting for him to continue.

"I can't just be angry with Percy for sacrificing himself for the Minister. If one of us dies... isn't it more or less for the same cause – to bring You-Know-Who down? It's not fair of us to be so self-righteous, only because he decided to fight at another front. He's still our brother, isn't he?" Ron still didn't look up, as he spilled out his thoughts, his face glowing red.

Fred and George were staring at their brother with strange looks. Hesitantly they nodded. "Yeah, somehow you are right," said George. "I mean, he was a prat most of the time," Fred continued. "But it's wrong to call him a coward. He had decided differently than the rest of the family, but he pulled his decision through to the end."

Silence fell upon the kitchen once more, only broken by the occasional knocking noise when someone brought down his bottle to the table.

Leo looked around a bit uncomfortably. It was obvious that the others were lost in their memories of Percy. But Leo hadn't known Percy and felt left out. He cleared his throat uneasily and stood up. "Er...well, I'm going to bed now," he said and left the Burrow to walk over the short distance to the hen house.

Only a few seconds later he was back into the kitchen, his face flushed in excitement and a bit of fear.

"Look, what I've found!" he shouted. "It was caught in the wards; obviously it was looking for a way to get in."

Harry, Ron, Sirius, Fred and George were staring at Leo, who was holding a struggling rat in his hand – a rat with a silver paw.

A/N: sorry that you always have to wait such a long time for new chapters. I won't make any promisses that the next chapter will come sooner, because the last times I broke them anyway. I'll definitely finish this story - I won't leave it uncompleted. But it will take me a while - only 3 or 4 chapters to go, though :-)

Best regards, Loewin


	26. Something of Gryffindor

**Chapter 26 – Something of Gryffindor**

Harry jumped up to close the door behind his brother, while Sirius pulled out his wand and made the rat unable to move.

"Wormtail..." Hate, contempt and regret lay in this single word as Sirius stared disbelievingly at the rat, who had once been his friend before he betrayed Lily and James to Voldemort, and put Sirius into Azkaban for twelve years.

Leo looked at Sirius in shock. "This is Wormtail? Peter Pettigrew?" Slowly he lifted the stiff animal up to have a better look at it. It was a skinny rat that once must have been fat, as the skin and fur seemed much too big for its tiny body. The fur was a dirty brown and some patches were bald. The little black eyes were the only parts of the rat's body, which were able to move at the moment. They darted from Sirius to Leo to Harry to the three Weasleys, panic written clearly into them. The most prominent part of the rat was the shining silver paw.

Sirius held out his hand and Leo put the rat carefully into it. Not too gently, Sirius set the animal down on a chair.

"Harry, get ready to hold him. I'm transforming him."

Harry stood behind the chair, a mask of control and concentration on his face. Fred, George and Ron were standing around the chair as well, pointing their wands at it. Leo was watching from the background, astonished about the things suddenly going on in the kitchen.

"_Animorphus Hominum_," said Sirius neutrally.

A flash of bright blue hit the rat and it grew rapidly, limbs becoming longer, the head rounder, the nose shorter... until a small, middle-aged man sat on the kitchen chair, his face contorted in fear.

"_Incarcerus!_" cried the three Weasley boys simultaneously and three ropes came flying out of their wands, binding the Death Eater tightly to the chair.

"What are you doing here, Pettigrew," growled Sirius lowly.

"Sirius, everyone said you died in the Ministry last year."

"Yeah well. I'm alive now. And I have asked you a question, Pettigrew." He spat the name out like something rotten.

Wormtail cowered and turned towards Harry and Ron. "Dear boys, I came back to you. I'm your friend. I was doing the Dark Lord's bidding only because I feared him. But now I left him. To come back to you."

Ron tried to catch Harry's attention to show him how he rolled his eyes about Wormtail's pathetic speech. But Harry was too focused on the man who had brought so much suffering to him and his family by his cowardice. So Ron settled for a low "Yeah right" out of the corner of his mouth.

"What do you want here at the Burrow?" Sirius asked, ignoring the stammering of his former friend. "What did Voldemort tell you to do here?"

Wormtail winced at the use of the Dark Lord's name.

"Are you looking for a certain object?" Leo piped up from behind the chair.

Wormtail spun his head around as far as he could and stared at the boy for a long time.

"Who are you," he asked carefully, a hint of suspicion in his voice.

"We are the ones who are asking the questions," said Sirius sharply and jumped forward to turn the chair Wormtail was sitting on, so that he couldn't see Leo any more.

"He looks a bit like Harry, doesn't he? A bit like James," whispered Wormtail.

"Shut up. Tell us what you were looking for!" shouted Harry, his eyes flickering fearfully to his younger brother. He didn't even want to imagine, what could happen, if Voldemort found out about his family.

Steps could be heard upstairs now. Harry's shouting must have alarmed the other inhabitants of the Burrow.

"Too bad that we have no Veritaserum," murmured Sirius under his breath.

"Yes, of course!" said the Weasley twins in unison.

"Fred, when did we become so soft in our old brains?" asked George melodramatically.

"Must have happened after we turned seventeen. Everything goes downwards from adulthood on..." Fred added regretfully.

"Could you please tell us, what you have in mind," said Harry in a strained voice.

"Out-with-it-powder," George said proudly.

"You pour it down the neck of a person, just like itching powder," Fred explained.

"And it has something else in common with itching powder," George interrupted his brother.

"It itches!" both said grinning. "It itches stronger and stronger until the person answers the questions truthfully."

Sirius nodded, a cold smile on his face. "Do you have some of this stuff here in the house?"

The twins nodded and darted up the stairs.

They returned to the kitchen a minute later, Fred holding a small paper envelope in his hand. Without further ado he poured the contents of it down the back of Wormtail's neck. The Death Eater stiffened his back uncomfortably, trying to move his hands out of the binding ropes to scratch himself.

"What are you doing here in the Burrow?" Sirius repeated his question.

Wormtail didn't say a word but squirmed and turned in the chair, grotesquely reminding the boys and Sirius to a dog that was chasing his own tail.

"Are you alone?" asked Harry.

"No, no," Wormtail answered distractedly, while he was obviously busy with his itching back. "No, the others are waiting at the forest edge. When I'm not back at eleven thirty, they are going to attack. They are working to bring down the wards as we speak"

It was ten past eleven now. The six listeners exchanged worried glances. Ron nodded grimly and ran upstairs to wake and warn all the others.

"So what is your mission," Sirius resumed the questioning.

Having noticed that the itching became slightly more bearable after he answered the first question, Wormtail exhaled defeatedly and sat very still now, pressing the words through his teeth.

"Sixteen years ago the Dark Lord gave me the task to come here and steal something for him," his eyes shifted to Fred and George for not even a second, before he looked down. "I don't know, what he needed it for, because I returned it back here only a night later. Nobody ever noticed that it had been missing. I have no idea, what he wanted with the thing. But anyway, he wants to have it now."

"And what were you stealing then?" snapped Harry impatiently.

"Nothing big or valuable. Only a hand of this clock." Wormtail pointed at the Weasley family clock. It didn't tell the time, but had nine hands on it, one for each family member. The clock showed what they were doing and if they were safe. "The one with the girl's face on it," Wormtail added, while everyone was staring at the clock.

Harry felt his knees become weak and grabbed the backrest of a nearby chair to steady himself. Ginny's clock hand was a Horcrux. Wormtail had stolen it, when she was a newborn baby and Voldemort had banned a piece of his soul into it. Harry shook his head and swallowed hard, trying to keep the feeling of sickness down. Ginny had already a too close encounter with one of Voldemort's Horcruxes, when she wrote into the Riddle diary in her first year. To find out that one of her most personal belongings was soiled so badly must shock and hurt her deeply.

Harry was interrupted in his thoughts, when Ron entered the kitchen, all the others, who were living in the Burrow these days following him. Ginny was looking at him worriedly and he felt even worse.

"We all need to leave now. Pettigrew has led the Death Eaters here." Sirius filled the others in quickly.

James and Lily were standing quite immovable in the kitchen, staring at the man, who they had thought was their friend when they had last seen him sixteen years ago.

Pettigrew turned pale. "No..." he whispered leaning back in his chair as far as the ropes would allow it. "But you... It's not possible. You can't be here. You're..."

"Peter." James' voice was full of hurt.

Amy and Leo shared a worried glance. They had never seen their parents so vulnerable before. Lily noticed their attention and shoved them gently towards Hermione.

"Please take the Floo back to the other house," she said as steadily as she could. "We'll come after you in a minute."

The twins nodded seriously, vanishing in the fireplace a second later together with Hermione.

"Take everything with you, what we need for the hunt," said Tonks, not wanting to use the word "Horcrux" in the presence of one of Voldemort's followers. In a hurry they picked up all the books, newspapers, maps and handwritten notes they had used for their research, everyone carrying something as they flooed to Grimmauld Place.

George, who was closest to the family clock, took it of the wall and after a moment, he and his twin brother too had vanished in the green flames.

Ten minutes later the four Marauders, Lily and Harry were the only people left in the room.

"Lily, James... I'm so sorry." Peter was sobbing now. "You have to believe me! I didn't want to betray you. I have never been as strong and brave as you all where. I never had a chance against him. He would have killed me."

"Peter," James said again, hesitantly stepping forward.

"No!" Pettigrew screamed. "No, don't touch me! Leave me alone! I said I'm sorry! No reason to haunt me!" The Death Eater was in a blind panic now, thrashing in the ropes that were binding him.

"Mum, Dad, we have to leave. The other Death Eaters will be here any time now." Harry was taking his mothers hand.

With a huge effort, James took his eyes off Peter Pettigrew and nodded. "Okay, let's..."

"Get down!" shouted Remus, pulling Lily out of the way as the kitchen window was bursting.

"Harry, go!" snapped James at Harry, who was closest to the fireplace.

"No, I won't leave you!" Harry answered, looking worriedly at his parents.

"Dammit kid! Go! We are coming after you! We are losing time!" shouted Sirius angrily.

Harry felt a stab in his stomach. By exactly this kind of behaviour Harry had lost Sirius the last time in the Ministry. Pressing his lips together tightly, he stepped into the fireplace, saying "Grimmauld Place."

Only seconds after he regained his footing, Lily fell out of the fireplace in the kitchen of Sirius' childhood home, followed by Remus.

All the others were gathered in the large basement kitchen too, looking shocked and frightened.

"What happened?" asked Hermione, her voice high pitched in fear.

Remus struggled to get his breathing under control again. "Greyback, Yaxley and..."

James and Sirius tumbled out of the fireplace, James cursing loudly. "Bloody Snivellus has seen us. Dammit!"

"Had eyes, round as saucers," added Sirius. "But Voldemort will know about us in no time, I'm afraid."

"What now?" asked a worried Mr. Weasley.

The group of luckily escaped witches and wizards stood in Grimmauld Place's kitchen, nobody saying a word. It was apparent that everyone was thinking hard about the question, Mr. Weasley had voiced.

"Looks like we have to take the defensive for now," said James tightly. "Try to keep those Horcruxes away from Voldemort until we manage to destroy them."

"Try to keep ourselves away from him, too," commented Fred wryly.

"Wait a minute! Horcruxes? Do we have more than the Locket now?" Ginny asked curious.

Harry couldn't bear to tell Ginny, what he had heard from Wormtail and furtively looked at Fred and George, who averted their eyes. Sirius sighed and took it upon himself to fill Ginny in, seeing how the boys were having trouble with spreading the bad news.

Ginny looked quite shaken upon hearing about the clockhand-Horcrux, but managed to keep her composition. "At least we know now, what it is," she commented in a feeble attempt to sound optimistic.

"But treating Wormtail with itching powder until he told the truth – that's torture, isn't it?" Hermione was obviously troubled by Sirius's story. "We must not employ such things as torture to reach our goals. That makes us no better than the Death Eaters!"

"Hermione, cut it," Fred said exasperatedly. "We would all be dead by now, if we hadn't done it! And it's only itching powder – it's not like it would really harm him."

Hermione still didn't look very happy, but didn't say anymore.

"How safe are we actually here now?" asked Harry to divert the attention from the awkward subject. Everyone was looking at Sirius.

The house-owner shrugged. "More or less safe – the wards would hold one or two hours in case of an attack. But we are trapped, now that we can't go back to the Burrow. We don't have any other Floo-connection; apparition does not work across the outer walls of the house and we can't just walk out of the main door, as the house is being watched," he gave a report about their current situation.

"That means we can't stay here," Lily concluded. "What's the alternative?"

Realizing that a long discussion would follow, and that nobody would go to bed before the question of their security was not solved, they tiredly settled around the kitchen table once more. It was close to midnight now.

"Whatever location we choose, each of us has to be able to find it on his own," said Tonks, thinking about her travelling between their new hideout and the Ministry to find out more about Voldemort's current location.

Mr. Weasley nodded. "You are right. We can't go to the new place in a group of fifteen people. We have to split up."

"Dad, Sirius and I wanted to go to Hogwarts anyway to get the Basilisk's teeth," said Harry. "Now that there is no school during the summer, we could camp in the Room of Requirement."

"But Harry!" exclaimed Hermione. "Malfoy knows about the room. And many other people know about it too."

"So what." Ron came to Harry's defence. "There is nobody there during the summer, apart from McGonagall maybe and I guess we can trust her. The Death Eaters would never guess that we are there."

Sirius shook his head. "No, I think Hermione is right. The risk is too high – too many people knowing. Wherever we are going to hide, we need a secret-keeper for the place and I think the Room of Requirement is way to public for that."

"So do we know of any place, not many other people know about?" Lily asked.

"Yes, actually I do," Sirius said hesitantly. "It's everything but comfortable, but it's not far away from Hogwarts. It'll be quite tight, but we will all fit in there..."

"You mean the cave near Hogsmeade, where you hid after escaping from Azkaban?" Harry asked shuddering, remembering the dark hole, the floor covered in rat bones.

"As I said, it's not comfortable, but it's the only place I could think of. Does anyone have another idea?"

No one had. But Tonks had another objection. "Sirius, we all don't know where this cave is. When we don't travel together, how are we supposed to find it?"

That question was settled quickly. Sirius, Harry, Ron and Hermione knew where the cave was located, so it was decided, that each of those four would be in one group.

"Alright. Now we know, where to go. But how do we get there?" said Fred.

"Didn't you say yourself that we are trapped in this house?" added George.

"I know!" cried Amy excitedly. "The same way we came in!"

Ron rolled his eyes. "Harry, no offence, but your sister doesn't seem to be the brightest." he whispered.

"Of course, Amy, you're a genius," said James, smiling proudly at his daughter. "The tunnel!"

"Yes, she does," Harry grinned at Ron.

"Well, now that this is settled, I suggest we get at least a few hours of sleep. We work out how we get to the cave in the morning. Let's hide all the documents in the tunnel now. In case, the Death Eaters really attack tonight already, we will be safe there for the moment."

To keep an eye on the wards of Grimmauld Place, Remus was appointed the first guard. James would take over for him after one hour. Everyone would get up at dawn so they could prepare their flight to Hogsmeade.

Before going off to bed, Lily walked over to Molly, who had not said one single word, since they had come to Grimmauld Place. "Molly, I'm really sorry about the funeral, about us not being able to properly say good bye to Percy." Percy's funeral would take place with or without the Weasleys in the morning of the next day, as Percy would be honoured directly by the Ministry as a hero who had saved Scrimgeour's life.

"I know." Molly said in a flat voice, her eyes dry and dead.

Lily was frightened to see the older woman look so defeated. She held Molly tight, trying to put all the comfort in the hug. "We'll work something out, to let you attend the funeral.

A/N: I'm happy that I finished this chapter before I go travelling for two months. I will take a scrapbook and pen with me of course to continue with the story, but I definitely will not be able to update until June.


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